To: Giordano Bruno who wrote (282975 ) 10/13/2010 1:07:35 PM From: Broken_Clock Read Replies (2) | Respond to of 306849 Are AG's in all 50 states gonna roll over and raise their asses collectively to Wall St? Can they find fraud? Maybe they should call Ambac. === Officials in 50 states launch foreclosure probe AP By ALAN ZIBEL, AP Real Estate Writer Alan Zibel, Ap Real Estate Writer – 26 mins ago WASHINGTON – Officials in 50 states and the District of Columbia have launched a joint investigation into allegations that mortgage companies mishandled documents and broke laws in foreclosing on hundreds of thousands of homeowners. The states' attorneys general and bank regulators will examine whether mortgage company employees made false statements or prepared documents improperly. Alabama initially did not sign on to the investigation. It reversed course after the joint statement was released. Attorneys general have taken the lead in responding to a nationwide scandal that's called into question the accuracy and legitimacy of documents that lenders relied on to evict people from the homes. Employees of four large lenders have acknowledged in depositions that they signed off on foreclosure documents without reading them. The allegations raise the possibility that foreclosure proceedings nationwide could be subject to legal challenge. Some foreclosures could be overturned. More than 2.5 million homes have been lost to foreclosure since the recession started in December 2007, according to RealtyTrac Inc. The state officials said they intend to use their investigation to fix the problems that surfaced in the mortgage industry. "This is not simply about a glitch in paperwork," said Iowa Attorney General Tom Miller, who is leading the probe. "It's also about some companies violating the law and many people losing their homes." Ally Financial Inc.'s GMAC Mortgage Unit, Bank of America and JPMorgan Chase & Co. already have halted some questionable foreclosures. Other banks, including Citigroup Inc. and Wells Fargo & Co. have not stopped processing foreclosures, saying they did nothing wrong. In a joint statement, the officials said they would review evidence that legal documents were signed by mortgage company employees who "did not have personal knowledge of the facts asserted in the documents. They also said that many of those documents appear to have been signed without a notary public witnessing that signature — a violation of most state laws. "What we have seen are not mere technicalities," said Ohio Attorney General Richard Cordray. "This is about the private property rights of homeowners facing foreclosure and the integrity of our court system, which cannot enter judgments based on fraudulent evidence." ====================== Ambac Sues Bank of America Over Countrywide Bonds By Karen Freifeld and David Mildenberg - Sep 29, 2010 10:46 AM GMT-1000 Brian T. Moynihan, president and chief executive officer of Bank of America Corp. Photographer: Jonathan Fickies/Bloomberg Ambac Assurance Corp. sued Bank of America Corp. over $16.7 billion of mortgage-backed securities, saying the bank’s Countrywide Financial Corp. unit fraudulently induced Ambac to insure bonds backed by improperly made loans.Ambac found that 97 percent of 6,533 loans it reviewed across 12 securitizations sponsored by Countrywide didn’t conform to the lender’s underwriting guidelines, according to the complaint filed yesterday in New York state Supreme Court. Many of the loans were made to borrowers with limited or no ability to meet their payment obligations, Ambac said. The lawsuit follows negotiations between Bank of America, which acquired Countrywide in 2008, and Ambac over mounting losses caused by loans made during the early 2000s as U.S. housing prices soared. Ambac has paid $466 million in claims from more than 35,000 Countrywide home-equity loans that have defaulted or been charged off, according to the lawsuit. “Bank of America probably didn’t settle because they didn’t want to swallow the amount of money that it’s going to take to satisfy Ambac,” said Alan White, a law professor at Valparaiso University who specializes in housing industry issues. “Nobody wants to be left holding the bag.” Shirley Norton, a spokeswoman for the Charlotte, North Carolina-based lender, and Ambac spokesman Pete Poillon, declined to comment on the lawsuit. Repurchase of Billions Repurchases of home loans from buyers and insurers of mortgage securities have already cost the four biggest U.S. lenders $9.8 billion, according to Credit Suisse Group AG. Bank of America has said it faces $11.1 billion of unresolved claims. MBIA Insurance said it paid more than $459 million in claims stemming from losses on Countrywide-sponsored mortgage- backed bonds, according to a 2008 lawsuit in New York State Supreme Court. The Ambac case involves 12 Countrywide-sponsored pools of home loans that were created from 2004 to 2006, including nine involving home equity lines of credit and three that involve fixed-amount second-lien loans. Bank of America should repurchase as much as $20 billion in home loans that were based on wrong or missing information, the Association of Financial Guaranty Insurers said in a Sept. 2 letter to Bank of America Chief Executive Officer Brian Moynihan. More than half of the soured home-equity credit lines and residential mortgages created from 2005 through 2007 that insurers examined were candidates for repurchase, the group said. Countrywide Losses Bank of America has reported $7.6 billion in losses from home-equity loans over the past four quarters, stemming from slumping U.S. home prices. Losses related to Countrywide loans, including repurchase requests, will continue through mid-2012, Moynihan said at a Sept. 14 investor conference. Bank of America in 2008 acquired Countrywide, the largest U.S. home lender at the time. “They’re manageable numbers, not pleasant numbers, but manageable numbers,” Moynihan said. Moynihan and other Bank of America officials have said the bank must review each loan to verify whether it met company guidelines. That process has delayed Ambac’s demands that Bank of America repurchase the loans, causing a breach of contract, according to the lawsuit. Ambac said in its complaints that it’s “entitled to redress for Countrywide’s massive fraud and pervasive and material breaches, including damages sufficient to place Ambac in the same position it would have been in had it never insured the transactions.” The case is Ambac Assurance Corp. v. Countrywide Home Loans Inc., 651612/2010, New York state Supreme Court (Manhattan).