subprime loans

As we noted on Wednesday, the House Financial Services Committee is in the midst of tackling financial regulatory reform, which has brought out the lobbyists in full force. Here’s just a small taste of the action so far: American Banker is reporting that the committee is close to carving out an exemption for community banks [...]

When is this ever going to end? Conservative lawmakers are seizing on ACORN’s troubles to once again go after the Community Reinvestment Act, an anti-redlining law that somehow became a scapegoat for the housing crisis last year, the AP reports.
The 1977 Community Reinvestment Act was intended to end redlining, a practice in which banks in [...]

A new study out today from the University of North Carolina Center for Community Capital provides more evidence that deregulatory zealots have a lot to answer for when it comes to the mortgage crisis: State anti-predatory laws actually worked, slowing down foreclosures.
But, alas, the state protections were overruled by the Office of the Comptroller of [...]

This shouldn’t go by unnoticed: The former head of Enron’s failed Internet division was just sentenced to 16 months in prison, The Washington Post reports. Joseph Hirko, the former broadband unit CEO also agreed to pay $8.7 million in restitution. Prosecutors contend Hirko falsely promoted Enron’s broadband division to analysts to help pump up the [...]

As TWI has reported, Wells Fargo & Co. teamed up with talk show host and commentator Tavis Smiley for “Wealth Building” seminars in black neighborhoods beginning in 2005. A suit by the Illinois attorney general contends Wells used the seminars to market high-cost and risky subprime loans to minority borrowers.
Smiley declined any comment for our [...]

Now that commentator and PBS talk show host Tavis Smiley has severed his ties to Wells Fargo & Co., what about the bank itself? As Smiley noted in his decision to cut business ties with Wells, the bank is facing several lawsuits charging that it engaged in illegal discriminatory lending practices by allegedly selling high-cost [...]

Prominent author, commentator and PBS talk show host Tavis Smiley has announced that he’s cutting all business ties to Wells Fargo & Co. The move comes in the wake of a TWI story last week about Wells Fargo “Wealth Building” seminars held in black neighborhoods starting in 2005, headlined by Smiley, which a recent lawsuit [...]

The PBS star attracted crowds to what appeared on the surface as a way to help black borrowers build wealth, but a lawsuit alleges it was actually just the opposite.

Ever wonder why loan modifications haven’t become the silver bullet that would solve the foreclosure crisis? Via Patrick.net, USA Today explains in simple terms a phenomenon TWI also has noted, when it comes to loan mods: Borrowers who can’t afford their mortgages and go looking for relief wind up with higher — not lower — [...]

Well, at least one banking executive is personally feeling the pain of the foreclosure crisis: Wells Fargo has fired a top employee who moved into a foreclosed Malibu beach house and threw lavish parties all summer there, the Los Angeles Times reports.
Cheronda Guyton, a senior vice president responsible for commercial foreclosed properties, broke company rules [...]