An
Ohio Bank Foreclosed On The Wrong House, And Repossessed All The Owner's Stuff [VIDEO] - (www.businessinsider.com) You
would definitely flip out if this happened to you. A central Ohio woman came
home from a two-week vacation to find that the bank had foreclosed on her house
and taken all her stuff, local station 10TV reports (h/t Gawker).
Apparently, First National Bank in Wellston had mistaken Katie Barnett's house
for the house across the street. She had to crawl through the window to get
inside. The worst part of this story may be that local police didn't help
Barnett, and the bank President said he wouldn't pay her back in full either —
she presented the bank with an $18,000 estimate. From 10TV: “He got very firm
with me and said, ‘We’re not paying you retail here, that’s just the way it
is,’” Barnett said. “I did not tell them to come in my house and make me an
offer. They took my stuff and I want it back... “Now, I’m just angry,” Barnett
said. “It wouldn’t be a big deal if they would step up and say ‘I’m sorry, we
will replace your stuff.’ Instead, I’m getting attitude from them. They’re
sarcastic when they talk to me. They make it sound like I’m trying to rip the
bank off. All I want is my stuff back.”
Detroit not a one-off, aftershocks will be
staggering: Whitney - (www.cnbc.com) Detroit's
leaders have set an important precedent in siding with residents rather than
unions and bondholders in their decision to declare the city bankrupt last
week, Meredith Whitney wrote in the Financial Times. As part of Detroit's
restructuring plan, Emergency Manager Kevyn Orr wants to treat general
obligation (GO) bonds as unsecured debt. If that request is approved by the
bankruptcy judge, the $3.7 trillion muni-bond market could be turned on its
head, as would the long-held assumption that GO bonds represent a relatively
risk-free investment. The root of the problem of struggling municipal finances
is local lawmakers being allowed to break promises to voters and run up large
tabs for future taxpayers, Whitney a banking analyst at Meredith Whitney
Advisory Group LLC said in an opinion piece in the paper. "As jarring as
the reality may be to accept, Detroit's decision last week to declare
bankruptcy should not be regarded as a one-off in the U.S. municipal
market." she said. "There are five more towns like Detroit in
Michigan alone. There are many more municipalities across the country in
similar positions."
Spanish
Pension Raids Spell Bad News for Bond Sales: Euro Credit (www.bloomberg.com) Spain’s Treasury may find one of its best customers
less eager to buy its bonds as budget woes lead Prime Minister Mariano
Rajoy to
raid a government piggy-bank for a second year. Created in 2000 to guarantee
pension payments in times of hardship, the 59.3 billion-euro ($78 billion) Fondo de Reserva was tapped for the first time in December
for 7 billion euros to fund Christmas bonuses and a monthly increase for
retirees. Further withdrawals will have taken an additional 4.5 billion euros
by the end of this month, helping to pay for pensioners’ summer bonuses and tax refunds. “The fund isn’t in a position to accumulate
assets anymore, it may even have to sell,” said Jose Antonio Herce, a partner
at consultancy firm Analistas Financieros Internacionales inMadrid. “There are more and more pensions to pay and
less and less money coming into the Social Security, the fund will melt quickly
now that we’ve started taking money out of it.” Rajoy is increasingly dependent
on the pension reserve fund as it reaps lower returns on Spanish sovereign
debt, which comprise 97.5 percent of its investments.
Nearly half of modified mortgages are in
default - (www.cnbc.com) Nearly
half of the mortgages modified in 2009 under the Obama administration's
signature homeowner rescue effort are in default again, according to a report
on Wednesday that raised concerns about the program's effectiveness. The report
from the Special Inspector General for the Troubled Asset Relief Program
(SIGTARP), the watchdog for the aid effort, said 46 percent of the struggling
homeowners who received loan modifications in 2009 under the Home Affordable
Modification Program had redefaulted. The Obama administration launched HAMP in
2009 to aid struggling homeowners impacted by the housing boom and bust. The
program, extended in May by two years to help more struggling borrowers keep
their homes, draws from the Treasury Department's financial bailout fund and
pays lenders and servicers to rewrite loan terms for borrowers who can't make
their current mortgage payments.
Senior Merkel ally says "very worried" about France: paper - (www.reuters.com) A leader of Germany's junior coalition party, the Free Democrats (FDP), has said he is very concerned about France and warned of severe consequences if the French economy does not recover. Rainer Bruederle, who is heading the FDP's campaign for September's federal election, told Handelsblatt daily in an interview the French government's decision to raise taxes was "fundamentally wrong". "I'm very worried about France," Bruederle told the paper. "The crisis in other states is somehow bearable, but if France doesn't get back on its feet, that would be tragic... We can't manage without France," Bruederle, a former economy minister, said. France is under pressure from its euro zone neighbors to deliver on promised reforms to boost competitiveness and cut spending, and Socialist President Francois Hollande has promised to tackle the country's indebted pension system.
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