Thursday, May 30, 2013

Friday May 31 Housing and Economic stories


TOP STORIES:

Detroit Beyond Repair; Next Stop: Cannibal Anarchy - (www.seattlepi.com) The first report by Detroit's emergency manager declares that the city is broke and at risk of running completely out of money — a financial meltdown that could mean employees don't get paid, retirees lose their pensions and residents endure even deeper cuts in municipal services. If Detroit cannot avert disaster by reducing its debt payments, the only remaining option appears to be bankruptcy, a threat that looms large over Kevyn Orr's urgent efforts to make deals with creditors and debt holders. Orr says he will have to seek concessions from those groups to keep the Motor City afloat. "On a cash-flow basis, we don't have it. We're broke," Orr said Monday at a news conference. He said the city can make payroll through the rest of the year, but that some other bills and obligations are not being paid or are being deferred.

Spanish banks face fresh hit from bad loans - (www.ft.com)
Spanish banks are bracing themselves for a fresh financial hit, amid rising pressure from the Bank of Spain on lenders to write down the value of their €200bn portfolio of restructured loans to the country’s troubled companies and struggling households. The move is likely to trigger a further rise in bad loan ratios across the system and reduce earnings at a time when most Spanish banks are already suffering from low profitability. Analysts believe the crackdown could also shine a harsh new light on the capital position of some of the weaker banks, forcing them to sell assets to avoid the need to raise fresh capital. The move reflects concern among Spanish regulators that banks are still shying away from admitting the full extent of the damage inflicted on their loan books by Spain’s long-running economic crisis. There is a particular worry that Spanish banks have sought to avoid losses by agreeing to refinance loans to struggling companies, even in cases where borrowers are unlikely to repay their debt – a practice known in banking circles as “extend and pretend” or “delay and pray”.

The coming political battle over Bitcoin - (www.washingtonpost.com) Given that Bitcoin first broke into mainstream attention when Gawker explained how to use it to buy drugs, perhaps the surprise is that it took federal regulators this long to take action against it. In the wake of the Gawker story two years ago, Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) describedBitcoin as an “online form of money laundering” and called for the authorities to shutter the Bitcoin-based drug market Silk Road. Yet until recently, the feds have taken a relatively hands-off posture. Agencies have issued guidelines and signaled that they are monitoring the situation, but none have taken active steps to force Bitcoin intermediaries to comply with federal regulations. That hands-off stance may have started to change this week when the feds took action against Mt. Gox, the world’s leading Bitcoin exchange. Many people use Dwolla, a PayPal-like payment network, to send dollars to their Mt. Gox accounts. They then use those dollars to buy Bitcoins. On Tuesday, Dwolla announced that it had frozen Mt. Gox’s account at the request of federal investigators. It’s the first federal action against the currency. CNet has confirmed that the asset seizure was initiated by Homeland Security Investigations, a division of Immigration and Customs Enforcement. Among other things, that agency has the power to enforce laws against money laundering and drug smuggling.

Lehman Reaches Beyond Grave to Grab Millions From Nonprofits - (www.bloomberg.com) Almost five years after Lehman Brothers Holding Inc (LEHMQ). filed for bankruptcy and set off the global financial crisis, managers of the bank’s estate are demanding millions of dollars from retirement homes, colleges and hospitals. After selling most of its assets, Lehman now says it was shortchanged by scores of nonprofits that were forced to pay to exit derivatives that were unwound after the firm filed for Chapter 11 protection. The Buck Institute for Research on Aging in Novato, California, gave Lehman $2 million in October 2008 to cancel a swap contract used to manage fluctuating interest rates. Lehman says it wants $12.1 million more and has assessed at least an additional $4.7 million in interest, the research center said in itsmost recent financial statement. The amount Lehman is seeking is more than half of what Buck spent last year researching Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s and other diseases.

Stern Advice-Retiring on 0.25 percent a year - (www.reuters.com) It isn't like Federal Reserve Board Chairman Ben Bernanke and his colleagues have it in for old people - I'm sure they are all very respectful of their elders. (The policy-setting reserve bank presidents typically have to retire when they are 65. Bernanke is 59.) But their policy of holding interest rates as low as they need to be to keep the economy in modest growth mode is also hitting Grandma and Grandpa particularly hard: At ages when most people try to keep their money "safe" in bank certificates of deposit and bonds, retirees are having to contend with returns that would be considered laughably bad if they didn't have to cover groceries and Medicare co-pays. The national average interest rate on a one-year CD is 0.25 percent, according to Bankrate.com. Ten-year Treasury notes are yielding less than 2 percent. Fed watchers expect the Fed to keep buying bonds and holding rates low for at least another year and possibly longer. New research from the Employee Benefit Research Institute shows that if those low rates were to continue permanently, more than a quarter of baby boomers and generation Xers would not be able to meet their retirement budgets.





Wednesday, May 29, 2013

Thursday May 30 Housing and Economic stories


TOP STORIES:

Banks on Verge of Collapse in Denmark Win Time in FSA Review - (www.bloomberg.com) Danish banks in breach of the nation’s solvency rules will get more time to raise capital and avert failure as the regulator eases its resolution practices. The Financial Supervisory Authority will give two banks currently in breach of individual solvency requirements the time they need to rebuild their capital buffers, said Anders Balling, head of banking at the regulator in Copenhagen. At the height of Denmark’s banking crisis two years ago, the FSA gave lenders as little as 48 hours to find investors before they were shut down. “We have moved away from an either-or model,” Balling said in a telephone interview. “We can see the benefits of a gradual approach. This is also part of the thinking in the new European capital requirement rules.”

JGBs skid for third session, pushing 10-yr yield to 9-month high - (www.reuters.com) Japanese government bond prices sold off for a third straight session on Tuesday and the benchmark yield hit a nine-month high, though a late downturn in shares pulled yields off their intraday highs. Decent demand at a 30-year auction did little to reassure some investors, particularly banks, which continued to cut their holdings of short- to medium-term notes. In recent sessions, the yen's weakness against the dollar has helped push up Japanese share prices, pressuring JGB prices which were already feeling the pinch from sagging U.S Treasuries. "The auction was better than some people had feared, but we have a series of auctions in the coming weeks," said Maki Shimizu, senior strategist at Citigroup in Tokyo. "Today's selloff was not driven by the auction," she said, but rather by the medium-term and the long-term tenors.

Why Did Mortgage Rates Spike Quickly To One-Month Highs? - (www.mortgagenewsdaily.com)  Mortgage rates rocketed higher precipitously today, taking them to their highest levels since April 2nd.  The move was all the more confounding as it happened on a day with no significant headlines or data releases--at least not the caliber of information that normally motivates such violent swings.  When the dust settled, borrowing costs at the 3.5% 'best-execution' were up anywhere from 0.4 to 1.2% depending on the scenario (this is equivalent to $400-$1200 in closing costs or lender credit for every $100k financed).  It was also enough of a move to bring 3.625% back into picture and as a viable best-execution contender.  The differences between those two rates are minimal in terms of efficiency, and in most cases, the choice amounts to a trade-off between up-front cost and monthly payment. While there was no overt causality for today's big movement, it wasn't without it's reasons.  That said, the reasons (or 'probable' reasons, as the case may be) have to do with some of the more esoteric factors driving mortgage rates.  We know that Mortgage-Backed-Securities (MBS)--the financial instruments that groups of similar loans ultimately become, have the most direct effect on mortgage rates.  We've also spoken about how the movements of MBS prices are often very similar to movement of bond prices, particularly in US Treasuries.  

Grind of Euro Crisis Wears Down Support for Union, Poll Finds - (www.nytimes.com) Europeans have never been wild about the European Union. With the region sapped by the euro crisis, confidence in the institution and the benefits it was supposed to provide is flagging faster and further than ever before, according to an influential opinion survey released Monday. The results of an annual survey by the Pew Research Center, a nonpartisan organization based in Washington, show a deepening disillusionment with the union in major member countries. The results of the survey suggest that more citizens than ever could end up opposing the transfer of more power to European Union institutions that may be vital for transforming the euro into a viable currency over the long term. “The effort over the past half-century to create a more united Europe is now the principal casualty of the euro crisis,” according to a report that Pew published with the survey results. The title of the report summed it up: “The New Sick Man of Europe: the European Union.”

62% of delinquent loans are more than 90 days past due - (www.ochousingnews.com) Lenders made no progress on their resolution of legacy loans over the last year. The delinquency rate of all loans inched down from 6.8% in March of 2012 to 6.59% in March of 2013. Given the improvement shown by recent vintages, that means the delinquency of legacy loans is unchanged, and itt may have gotten worse. As lenders kick the can with loan modifications, borrowers are redefaulting faster than lenders can remodify their loans. The only net reduction in legacy loan delinquencies is coming from the trickle of foreclosures. As a result, legacy loans now account for 62% of long-term delinquencies. Lenders are committed to a policy of can kicking until prices come back. They are foreclosing on a handful of committed squatters in an attempt to spook the herd and prompt them to agree to loan modifications. From their perspective, the plan is working. Remember, negative equity is another lender euphemism. It disguises the fact that lenders have a huge exposure to loans without collateral backing, and it makes borrowers feel like they have hope of actual equity again while they rent from the bank. (Notice the deception in the chart below that cuts off the bottom 10% to make the improvement look better than it is).




Tuesday, May 28, 2013

Wednesday May 29 Housing and Economic stories


TOP STORIES:

California Homeowner Bill of Rights blocks BofA foreclosure - (www.housingwire.com)
A California man successfully halted a foreclosure sale on his property using the newly minted California Homeowner Bill of Rights to obtain a court injunction against two foreclosing parties: Bank of America and its ReconTrust Co. subsidiary. For simply obtaining the HBOR injunction, the homeowner’s attorney is requesting $20,255 in legal fees and costs – a compensation request that is permissible under HBOR since the legislation allots borrowers reasonable attorneys fees and expenses for successfully obtaining an injunction. Attorney Robert Jackson with Jackson and Associates out of California says the injunction alone may cost BofA/Recontrust upwards of $60,000 when calculating in attorneys fees and expenses from both sides. "The biggest problem with the HBOR from the investor standpoint is the litigation risk of having to pay legal fees," Jackson said. "The way the thing breaks down is when you get an injunction, the prevailing borrower gets all of their legal fees paid by the servicer and the investor."

The IRS Has More Data About You Than Ever Before - (www.businessinsider.com) The Internal Revenue Service is collecting a lot more than taxes this year—it's also acquiring a huge volume of personal information on taxpayers' digital activities, from eBay auctions to Facebook posts and, for the first time ever, credit card and e-payment transaction records, as it expands its search for tax cheats to places it's never gone before. The IRS, under heavy pressure to help Washington out of its budget quagmire by chasing down an estimated $300 billion in revenue lost to evasions and errors each year, will start using "robo-audits" of tax forms and third-party data the IRS hopes will help close this so-called "tax gap." But the agency reveals little about how it will employ its vast, new network scanning powers.

IRS scrutiny of Tea Party causing furor - (www.sfgate.com)
Senior Internal Revenue Service officials knew agents were singling out Tea Party groups as early as 2011, according to a draft of an inspector general's report obtained by the Associated Press that seemingly contradicts public statements by the IRS commissioner. The IRS apologized Friday for what it acknowledged was "inappropriate" targeting of conservative political groups during the 2012 election to see if they were violating their tax-exempt status. The agency blamed low-level employees, saying no high-level officials were aware. But on June 29, 2011, Lois Lerner, who heads the IRS division that oversees tax-exempt organizations, learned at a meeting that groups were being singled out, according to the watchdog's report. At the meeting, she was told that groups with "Tea Party," "Patriot" or "9/12 Project" in their names were being flagged for additional and often burdensome scrutiny, the report says. The 9/12 Project is a group started by conservative TV personality Glenn Beck. Lerner instructed agents to change the criteria for flagging groups "immediately," the report says.

Obamas underwater rescue - (www.nydailynews.com) President Obama has finally moved to replace a little-known but powerful Washington bureaucrat who has stood in the way of important efforts to end America’s foreclosure crisis. The President’s decision is welcome — but further action is needed, right away, to provide the swift and fair relief homeowners need. Since 2009, Edward DeMarco has served as acting director of the Federal Housing Finance Agency, which oversees Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. He should have been a critical figure in setting policy to get us out of the foreclosure crisis. Instead, DeMarco’s most notable achievement has been blocking programs to help struggling homeowners. It has been more than five years since the housing bubble burst, but millions of Americans are still fighting to keep their homes. In the fourth quarter of 2012, 10.4 million properties — 21.5% of all homes with mortgages — had “negative equity,” owing more on their mortgages than their properties were worth. Right now, these homeowners are trapped under a $628 billion mountain of negative equity. Banks move to foreclose on 250,000 properties each quarter. That’s 2,700 families each day moving one step closer to losing their homes. Of course, foreclosure is a terrible event in the life of a family. But it isn’t so great for the folks who own the loans, either. It often takes long, expensive legal proceedings to reach resolution, with the prize being a property worth much less than the bank is owed.

Oregon Realtor Jailed for Fraud - Thousands of Realtors Still At Large - (www.ktvz.com) Former Bend Realtor Tami Sawyer and her husband Kevin, a former Bend police captain, are in jail, on their way to federal prison after being sentenced last week for fraud and money-laundering. But now renters who live in their homes are worried about their own future. The Sawyers own three homes in Bend that are being rented out. Renters were given a letter Monday saying the rent still must be paid to Genesis Futures, regardless of the fact the owners, the Sawyers, are in prison. "My first reaction was this is, probably another scam from the Sawyers," said one renter from the couple, who didn't want to show his face or share his name publicly. He, along with two other renters from the Sawyers, were handed those letters. "It is a shock to me that they would have any amount of authority from prison, especially after a conviction," the renter said.





Monday, May 27, 2013

Tuesday May 28 Housing and Economic stories


TOP STORIES:

75-Year-Old Soybean Planter Loses Against Monsanto In Supreme Court - (www.businessinsider.comThe US Supreme Court ruled in favor of Monsanto Monday over an Indiana farmer accused of having pirated the genetically-modified crops developed by the agribusiness giant. The high court was unanimous in its decision, ruling that laws limiting patents do "not permit a farmer to reproduce patented seeds through planting and harvesting without the patent holder's permission." The crux of the argument was over "patent exhaustion" which states that, after a patented item has been sold, the purchaser has "'the right to use (or) sell' the thing as he sees fit." But the court's 10-page opinion says patent exhaustion only applies to the actual item sold -- in this case the seed itself -- and still prevents anyone from making, using and selling copies of the item. The ruling gave Monsanto shares a bounce after falling more than one percent in opening trade Monday. At 10:20 (1420 GMT) they were at $107.59, down 0.5 percent.

ECB's Visco: Deposit Rates Could Go Below Zero - (www.cnbc.com) European Central Bank governing council member Ignazio Visco told CNBC that the central bank is "technically prepared" to introduce negative deposit rates which would see banks effectively having to pay the ECB to hold deposits, but was aware of the potential "unintended consequences" of such a move. Visco, an Italian economist and the current governor of the Bank of Italy, said that the bank was "technically prepared to go in that direction" but the decision depended on whether the economy needed further help. "We all agreed in the council that we have to look with care and in that case we may reduce the [deposit] rate. We think that - and I personally think that, this is effective – the economy now is capable of taking it on board. Technically, we are equipped and ready to intervene. There may be unintended consequences - we know we may have to work on that - and we know how to work on that," Visco told CNBC on the sidelines of the Group of Seven (G7) meeting in London this weekend.

Schäuble warns EU bank rescue agency needs treaty changes - (www.ft.com) Germany’s finance minister has warned that a single EU bailout agency and rescue fund for ailing banks is legally untenable until the bloc’s treaties have been overhauled. In today’s Financial Times, Wolfgang Schäuble calls for a “two-step approach” that would leave bank rescues in the hands of “a network of” national authorities until treaty changes can take place. Mr Schäuble’s declaration comes just weeks before the European Commission is due to present its plan for a single bank resolution agency and rescue fund – widely touted as the second pillar in the eurozone’s much-vaunted “banking union” – throwing the proposal into doubt even before it is unveiled.

Another Automaker With A Federal Loan Blames Its Failure On The Fisker Fiasco - (www.businessinsider.com
The ex-CEO of a now-defunct automaker that received a federal loan said his company would still be in business if the government were not afraid of backlash like that following the failure of electric automaker Fisker. The automaker, Vehicle Production Group (aka VPG Autos), produced the MV-1, a six-passenger, wheelchair-accessible van than can run on gasoline or environmentally-friendly compressed natural gas. It raised $400 million in private equity, and received $50 million under the Department of Energy's Advanced Technologies Vehicles Manufacturing Loan Program (ATVM) — the same program that gave loans to Fisker, Tesla, Ford, and Nissan. Under the terms of its loan, VPG was required to keep a certain amount of cash on hand. When it fell below that level, the DOE froze its assets on February 29. VPG was forced to cease operations, and laid off all but three of its 100 employees, including former CEO John Walsh.

Spain Home Expropriation Plans Seen Violating EU Bailout - (www.bloomberg.com) Spanish politicians trying to cushion the blows of austerity plan to seize foreclosed homes to house the needy, discouraging foreign investment and threatening to violate terms of the European bailout of the country’s banks. The regional governments of Andalusia, with the most vacant properties in the country, and the tourist destination of the Canary Islands, are planning to expropriate foreclosed properties for as long as three years to house displaced families. The European Commission has asked Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy’s government for details on the regions’ actions, to ensure they don’t clash with the country’s commitments. “It’s third world, populist and akin to policies more commonly seen in Bolivia and North Korea,” said Mikel Echavarren, chief executive officer of Irea, a Madrid-based restructuring firm that has advised on 22 billion euros ($28.6 billion) of refinancing. “Investors fear it will set a precedent and other regions will follow suit, making Spanish real estate investment an extremely high-risk activity.”





Sunday, May 26, 2013

Monday May 27 Housing and Economic stories


TOP STORIES:

Student Debt a 'Roadblock' for Wider Economy: Report - (www.cnbc.com) Crushing student debt is not only killing dreams, it's hurting the broader economy. The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) is warning of the "potential domino effects" to the economy of high student debt. A just-released report from the consumer watchdog highlights the ways this debt can deplete savings, limit spending, and shape choices about a graduate's career path and where to live. "College can open up many opportunities, and we do not want that college degree to become more of a burden than a blessing for those saddled with unmanageable debt in a tough employment market," said CFPB director Richard Cordray in a statement. "So we are concerned that unmanageable student loan debt may be harmful to recovering consumer markets and may be dragging down borrowers' lives." The average amount of student loan debt for the Class of 2011 was $26,600, a 5 percent increase from approximately $25,350 in 2010, according to The Project on Student Debt.

Investors Rediscovering Margin Debt - (online.wsj.com) Small investors are borrowing against their portfolios at a rapid clip, reaching levels of debt not seen since the financial crisis. The trend—driven by a combination of rising stock values and rock-bottom interest rates—is sparking a growing debate among market watchers. To some, this trend in so-called margin debt is a sign of investors' increasing confidence in a bull market for stocks that has already lifted the Dow Jones Industrial Average 15.1% in 2013. But to others it is a warning sign that the Federal Reserve's easy-money policies are creating a bubble mentality among stock investors. As of the end of March, the most recent data available, investors had $379.5 billion of margin debt at New York Stock Exchange member firms, according to the Big Board. That is just shy of the record $381.4 billion in margin debt set in July 2007.

Realtors charge $50 to view $5M house (ca.finance.yahoo.com)  The listing says it all: At almost $5 million, it's an exceptionally rare and highly-coveted Toronto Beach-area home with direct waterfront access on an acre of land. There's a two-floor guest house and a wrap-around porch and much, much more. Just as rare is the section that reads, "$50 Charitable Donation Required/Accepted Prior To Showing Payable To SickKids Foundation. Receipt Will Be Provided."  The idea is to keep the gawkers away, said Dagmara Lulek, the Royal LePage listing agent, who along with Vito Doria proposed the idea to the owner.  Since the owner prefers a non-traditional viewing of the house, agents and their interested clients have been asked to make donations to browse the property at 1 Fallingbrook Rd. The money will go to SickKids, a not-for-profit children's charity. "This is somebody's home. We can't have people coming through the home just to be curious," says Lulek.

The Great Housing Trade Part 2. Featuring the Vegas Debacle - (www.mhanson.com) Like so many other epic bubble years’ housing market explosion epicenters, Las Vegas real estate caught fire again pushing prices up 30% YoY vs the 10% national average.  This statement alone should raise a plethora of red flags to anybody remotely familiar with the sector.  But to new-era residential housing “investors”, who have serious selective, mid, and long-term memory ‘challenges, this is what a “housing market recovery” looks like this time around.  I beg to differ. That’s because there is little about the past year of ‘better’ housing market data that is rooted in economic fundamentals(things that drive “durable housing market expansion).   It’s not like house sales volume, rents, jobs, or income is surging.   It’s not like supply is so ‘low’ because demand is surging;  rather, it’s because 6 million units of supply headed for market was rented back to its’ legacy owners by the banks and gov’t in the form of mods;  several states made it virtually illegal to foreclose;  and foreclosure timelines were being stretched out 15 days for every 30 that passed. But besides all that, taken in the context of “post-crash” the past year of data are “underwhelming” especially relative to consensus opinion, sentiment, and periods prior to 2007.    That’s because this market is structurally broken. It lacks the fundamentals horsepower imperative to a “durable” housing market recovery.   And without the fundamentals in the drivers’ seat, the past year of housing market activity is more closely akin to a stock market “short squeeze” than anything else.

All Empires Crash Soon After They Reach Their Peak (www.ritholtz.com) Thomas Edison said, “Dissent is the highest form of patriotism.”   And because I love my country, I frequently criticize America’s shortcomings in the hopes of making her better. But the truth is that the United States is not unusual … it is just like all other empires which have hit their peak and then quickly crashed. We noted in 2008: Political insider and veteran reporter Kevin Phillips has documented that every major empire over the past several hundred years has undergone a predictable cycle of collapse, usually within 10 to 20 years of its peak power. The indications are always the same:
- The financialization of the economy, moving from manufacturing to speculation;
- Very high levels of debt;
- Extreme economic inequality;
– And costly military overreaching.
We wrote in 2009: In 2000, America was described as the sole remaining superpower – or even the world’s “hyperpower”. Now we’re in real trouble (at the very least, you have to admit that we’re losing power and wealth in comparison with China).





Thursday, May 23, 2013

Friday May 24 Housing and Economic stories


TOP STORIES:

Most of Cyprus pain inflicted on overseas depositors, central bank says - (www.reuters.com) Cyprus' central bank said on Thursday most of the depositors who lost money at bailed-out Bank of Cyprus were from overseas and that Cypriots had not been hit as hard as might have been expected. "Seventy percent of the value of deposits concerned overseas residents, leaving Cypriot households and businesses unaffected to a greater extent than was possibly expected," Central Bank of Cyprus Governor Panicos Demetriades told a news conference. He said overall 96 percent of deposits in Cyprus were unaffected by losses on larger accounts required by the euro zone in exchange for aid to the overly indebted country.

Stodgy Netherlands is nation that'll blow up euro - Matthew Lynn - (www.marketwatch.com) Which euro-zone country is most deeply in debt? The profligate Greeks, with their generous state-funded pensions? The Cypriots and their banks stuffed with dodgy Russian money? The recession-hit Spaniards or the boom-and-bust Irish? None of the above. Actually, it is the sober, responsible Dutch. Consumer debt in the Netherlands has hit 250% of available income, one of the highest levels in the world. In Spain, by comparison, it has never gone above 125%. The Netherlands has turned into one of the most heavily indebted countries in the world. It has slumped into recession and shows very little sign of coming out of it. The euro crisis has been dragging on for three years now but so far has only infected the peripheral nations within the single currency. But the Netherlands is a core member of both the euro and the European Union. If it can’t survive in the euro zone, then the game really will be up.

Federal judge questions constitutionality of Colorado foreclosure law - (www.denverpost.com) A federal judge on Monday made the rare move to stop the foreclosure auction of an Aurora woman's house in a case that squarely takes on the constitutionality of Colorado's foreclosure laws. U.S. District Judge William Martinez issued a preliminary injunction against the sale of Lisa Kay Brumfiel's four-bedroom home, scheduled for Wednesday in Arapahoe County, until the judge can decide whether parts of state law are unfair to homeowners facing the loss of their house. At issue is a provision in state law that allows lawyers to assert that their client, typically a bank, has the right to foreclose on a property even though they might not have the original mortgage paperwork to prove it. What makes the case compelling isn't just that a federal judge was persuaded to step into an issue involving state law — extremely difficult to do — but the plaintiff in the case is a part-time saleswoman who has taken on the battle without a lawyer.

Big Banks Push Back Against Tighter Rules - (online.wsj.com) The nation's biggest banks are going on the offensive to fend off growing efforts in Washington to rein them in. The banks have hired longtime, influential Washington hands to deflect regulatory and political pressure to strengthen their finances and to sell assets. Regulators and some lawmakers have raised concern that large banks remain "too big to fail" and could require another government bailout in the event of a new financial meltdown. The effort by banks marks a lobbying turning point for the industry, which adopted a mostly low-profile stance to new regulations in the wake of the financial crisis. 

2 banks violated mortgage accord (news.yahoo.com)  New York's attorney general on Monday accused Wells Fargo and Bank of America of violating the terms of last year's national mortgage settlement by failing to process hundreds of refinancing requests promptly. Attorney General Eric Schneiderman has notified the national monitoring committee established to enforce the five-bank agreement, citing complaints of 210 prompt-processing violations by Wells Fargo and 129 by Bank of America. If the committee defers taking action, Schneiderman said he will sue for compliance. Under the settlement, the banks are required to respond to mortgage modification requests within 30 days. Schneiderman said delays put homeowners further into debt from missed payments and penalties, pushing them closer to foreclosure.






Wednesday, May 22, 2013

Thursday May 23 Housing and Economic stories


TOP STORIES:

Irvine's Great Park boondoggle blows $200 million  - (www.ochousingnews.com) What happens when you give politicians $200 million with no accountability? They blow it. So it was with the money the City of Irvine extracted from developers to create the Great Park. So far, the City has brought in about $250 million, yet only about 15% of the park is developed, and what’s out there doesn’t look like $250 million worth of facilities. Most of the money was simply wasted. Irvine taxpayers paid for a park and all they got to show for it is a balloon, over-hyped and over-priced conceptual plans, and a giant pile of runway rubble. The City of Irvine was given $200 million in cash. What we got for this money is of dubious value, and if some private developer would have done it, only a tiny fraction of that money would have been spent. Lennar then began working on its plan to build thousands of homes and millions of square feet of retail space in nearby Great Park Neighborhoods. But the plan to build housing was put on ice after Lehman Brothers Holdings Corp., the project’s main lender, failed in 2008, and the housing market crashed. In the meantime, the city spent the $200 million Lennar gave it, as well as about $50 million generated by leases on the land at the former base, on concerts, fairs, architectural design, a free hot-air balloon ride attraction and some construction. So far, only a fraction of the park is developed.

Fed should get out of MBS, avoid overstimulating housing - (www.reuters.com) A recovery in the housing market means the Federal Reserve should think about how to reduce its holdings of mortgage-backed securities over time in order to avoid creating another bubble in real estate, a top central banker said on Friday. "The housing market seems like it is recovering quite well at this point. At some point, I think the recovery we've seen in the housing market means we ought to be thinking about shifting our portfolio away from mortgage-backed securities," said Richmond Federal Reserve President Jeffrey Lacker. He said the timeframe for this shift should be "a couple of years," and could involve using payments from maturing MBS to buy U.S. Treasury notes, rather than rolling them back into MBS, as well as reducing the pace of MBS buying.

Special Report: Subprime bond bounces back, leaving behind a subprime borrower - (www.reuters.com) During the crazy days of the housing bubble in 2006, bankers created a bond called MABS 2006-FRE1. The instrument gave buyers the right to payments on the subprime housing loans of nearly 2,000 borrowers, including Stephen Monzione, a professional wedding photographer in New Hampshire. Six months after the security was issued, a trader called it a "crap bond." Monzione, with a monthly income of about $900 and mortgage payments of $927.22, eventually stopped paying. So did hundreds of other people. The bank that originated the loans went bust. The bond's value crashed to 16 cents on the dollar. Today, the subprime bond is rising from the ashes. The subprime borrower isn't. A hedge fund manager in Colorado snapped up MABS 2006-FRE1 last summer and more than doubled his money in four months, thanks to a surge of investment into financial markets by the Federal Reserve. The U.S. central bank hasn't been as helpful to Monzione. The 60-year-old lost a foreclosure battle and must be out of his home by the end of July. "God bless them," Monzione marvels at the traders who flipped the bond of which his loan was a part. "I don't have a clue about what the hell that means to me personally."

Many Americans say they can't retire until their 70s or 80s - (www.latimes.com) It’s the new retirement: More than four in 10 Americans think they’ll have to work into their 70s or 80s because they can’t afford to retire, according to a new survey. One in 10 people expects to toil into their 80s, while 32% expect to be on the job into their 70s, according to the report by insurer Northwestern Mutual. On average, those surveyed expect to leave work at age 68. However, the report points out, that doesn’t jibe with reality. The mean age of those already retired is 59, the study said. An increasing number of people figure they’ll simply work longer to make up for inadequate nest-egg savings these days, not realizing how layoffs, poor health or other forces pushed their forebears out of the workforce far sooner than they wanted.

Kuroda Stimulus Backfires as Mortgage Costs Rise: Japan Credit - (www.bloomberg.com) Bank of Japan Governor Haruhiko Kuroda’s stimulus policies are backfiring in the housing market, where mortgage rates are rising even as the central bank floods the financial system with cash. While 35-year home-loan costs rose one basis point to 1.81 percent this month from an all-time low of 1.8 percent in April, any increase will be undesirable for the BOJ, according to Mizuho Securities Co. Federal Reserve Chairman Ben S. Bernanke’s monetary easing almost halved 30-year U.S. mortgage rates since 2008 to 3.35 percent on May 2. The BOJ’s April 4 announcement that it would double bond buying to generate 2 percent inflation unleashed the highest government-debt volatility in a decade and pushed 10-year yields up by 4 1/2 basis points. The benchmark lending rate for large corporations, known as the prime rate, increased five basis points from its record low to 1.2 percent on April 10, despite the BOJ’s aim of stoking the economy through cheaper funding.