Here is an article from Dealbook at NY Times.

The Treasury Department expects to recover all but $42 billion of the $370 billion it has lent to ailing companies since the financial crisis began last year, with the portion lent to banks actually showing a slight profit, according to a new Treasury report, Jackie Calmes writes in The New York Times.

The new assessment of the $700 billion bailout program, provided by two Treasury officials on Sunday ahead of a report to Congress on Monday, is vastly improved from the Obama administration’s estimates last summer of $341 billion in potential losses from the Troubled Asset Relief Program. That figure anticipated more financial troubles requiring intervention.

The officials said the government could ultimately lose $100 billion more from the bailout program in new loans to banks, aid to troubled homeowners and credit to small businesses.

Still, the new estimates would lower the administration’s deficit forecast for this fiscal year, which began in October, to about $1.3 trillion, from $1.5 trillion.

The report could tamp down some of the public anger directed against both parties over the bailouts. Congressional leaders are already planning to use some of the program’s money for economic stimulus and job creation.

Of course, the government’s potential losses extend beyond the Treasury program. The Federal Reserve, for example, still holds a trillion-dollar portfolio of mortgage-backed securities whose market value is unknown.

The improved picture of the Treasury program is the result of higher-than-expected returns on the loans and the fact that, as the financial sector has recovered from its free fall last year, the government has not had to use much more of its $700 billion in lending authority this year, according to the Treasury officials, who declined to be identified as discussing the report before it was presented to Congress.

Last week, Bank of America became the latest big bank to say that it was raising private capital and would soon repay its $45 billion bailout loan. Once that payment is made, Citigroup will be the last big bank tethered to the state.

The estimated $42 billion in losses is a net figure that accounts for some profits to offset the losses. The Treasury officials said the government had lost about $60 billion, roughly half to Chrysler and General Motors and the other half to the insurance giant American International Group.”

Read the full article here.

From the Drudge Report today: Bank of America posts $2.24 billion in losses on home loan defaults.

Maybe their borrowers defaulted because they took BofA’s advice, and bought pizza to make dough?

I came across this odd bit of news from Reuters.

It seems that Dalton Chiscolm is really, really mad at Bank of America. Mr. Chiscolm has entered a lawsuit against B of A in the amount of 100,000,0000,000,000,000,000 for bad customer service.

Man sues B of A for “1,784 billion, trillion dollars”

Wow, that’s a lot of zeros! I’m just guessing here, but that is also likely to be the amount B of A “borrowed” from the Fed in TARP funds in a weak and misguided lie to supposedly “help” struggling homeowners avoid foreclosure.

I’m right there with ‘ya, Mr. Chiscolm! While I don’t quite understand the reference to “Spanish worm,” I whole-heartedly agree that the American consumers need to hold these banks and lending institutions accountable. We should all sue the Banks!

The banks thought nothing of manipulating customers into shitty loans and then raping them with changing rates, late fees, and, eventually foreclosure in the name of the Almighty Profit. Banks created this financial mess, they knew that the high issuance of ARM’s would lead to a mass of foreclosure properties, by which (they hoped) would lead to even greater profits when foreclosed and re-sold at the height of the housing bubble. But it backfired on them, housing values tanked, and banks had billions of dollars in toxic debt on the books. Then the Fed rode to the rescue to bail them out.

But who bails out the homeowners? NO ONE, that’s who. The American homeowners are like Lavinia, left raped in the woods, hands cut off, and tongue ripped out, unable to speak. The right-wing party pundits, our would-be Titus, is ready to slit our throat and finish us off for good, while having us believe it was our fault, not the banks, and putting us out of our misery for our own good.

I sincerely hope Bank of America’s legal problems lead to its demise, but it looks as if Mr. Chiscolm’s case may be dismissed. (Hmmm, maybe the Spanish worm part wasn’t such a good idea after all)

I am curious to know, Mr. Chiscolm, how you managed to get this lawsuit in front of the same judge that handled the Bernie Madoff case? Way to Go! I applaud you sir! If by some chance you happen to read this blog in the infinite space of the Internet, give me a holler. I’m with you pal!

“poland okays forcible castration for pedophiles” serves these sickos right!
“man sues BofA for 1,784 billion, trillion dollars” even dr. evel from austin powers would be apalled by that amount…

In the book, 20th Century American Struggle, 21st Century Hope, there is a scenario where there is a table with ten (10) seats and set with massive amounts of the best foods on earth.

Imagine you being one of these ten people in the seat. You just came in from a hard day’s work and you’re ready to grub down with 9 other folks. As you are about to eat, one of the other 9 persons summons their workers over to the table to take 90% of the food off the table with instructions to cart the food off to their warehouse which they hoard away from everyone else.

What would you do? What would you say?

Well, the truth is that most of us are experiencing this everyday and we say or do nothing. In America, less than 10% take over 90% of the American economic pie and hoard it away in far off shore accounts or investments in other lands that Americans cannot benefit from.

It is very clear that there are powerful elite in America who are bent on dominating the majority of us. J.P. Morgan was the dominate player who contributed to the cause of the Great Depression coming on, and he used some of his own money to prop up the falling Wall Street. Today we now know that Merrill Lynch, AIG, Lehman Brothers, BofA, Countrywide and others collectively focused so much on stripping personal and commercial equity from us that they caused the Second Depression, albeit not as Great as the first. At least so far.

Americans are very much in trouble. They have no power over the decisions that politicians make on economic issues and they reject the sane insights of Michael Moore, Ross Poret, Ralph Nadar and others who have been calling our in the Wilderness for years. Capitalism is showing just how ugly and nasty it can be when the majority buy into its deception. Its okay when regulated, but destructive when not. Reagan convinced most to accept Trickle Down economics. That is where the wealthiest are given a greater share of the economic pie and let their crumbs fall down for others to pick up. The obvious problem to this, is that One (1) percent at the top gets over 50% of this pie and another 9% gets most of what is left.

Politicians are ABSOLUTELY bought out by those who have massive amounts of money. Only if politicians have a lot of money, as some of the Kennedys showed, and have a tradition of caring for people, will politicians be able to resist much of the greed and corruptions that take place.

We can wish America to get better all we want. It will not happen on its own. Coupled with racism, our capitalistic system is one of the most insensitive in the world. We are materially better off than 90% of the countries out there. But something that is inherent to elite of every country, they are still bent on enslaving the majority out of some sense of superiority that dangles in a self God perspective of themselves.

The founding Fathers of America knew this well and is why the Second Amendment was in fact second to the first. To carry arms was, and to a certain extent, still important. But in this 21st Century, the elite of the world will not be checked by pistols when they have smart bombs and cell phones that tracks our every movement. The common people need more sophisticated and powerful weapons to combat these every growing and dominating elite forces.

Specifically, we need to be able to sue the hell out of our Senators and Congressmen. They will only give access, real influential access, to those with money. Well, if citizens were to be able to sue them with those they conspire with, then this would level the playing field quite a bit. You see, right now, our officials protect themselves by enacting laws which give them immunity. This is detrimental for citizens. Revolution can only be won if citizens rise up and demand the right to sue their representatives in courts.

President Obama is now talking about taking away or reducing citizens rights to sue insurance companies, not to benefit citizens, but to benefit the elite. Keep in mind that their profits are more than 1000% even with citizens suing insurance companies. The problem is they do not want to be penalized in a way which would cause them to act ethically.

To have a revolution we must be intentional about it. To be a slave, we must remain passive.

In a nutshell, WE HAVE BEEN LIED TO.

The government took OUR money and gave OUR money to banks and financial institutions to “SAVE the American economy” and keep a few cents in the value of a dollar. Their words, not mine!!

Today is August 26, 2009 and just about a month ago, Bank of (Obama’s) America (B of A)claimed a “rebound” and that they could pay the United States taxpayer back. Banks were quoted as saying “We Made Our Profits In This Quarter” to the tune of billions.

And so on this date, the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation or FDIC, states that it is rapidly running out of money to cover all of America’s banks. Part of the “reason” for this is that the housing market and the super weak economy is drowning in red ink. Literally!!

If you listen to the “Obama Think Tank”, you would be convinced that the economy and all it’s representations are on the mend.

Just a few days ago, the media in all it’s forms and through government information channels, “BOASTED A SLIGHT RISE IN THE HOUSING MARKET”. A blatant distortion of the truth so that this Obama dictatorship can smile in the face of the American taxpayer and say “see, we are doing it right, your money is working”.

But, smooth sailing we are not!!

Currently, there are 117 banks on the FDIC trouble list. The highest number in 5 years and growing.

You don’t say!!!!

Sean Ryan, a banking analyst with Sterne Agee, said “We’ve only seen the tip of the iceberg”. Now, this might sound good to that drip Al Gore when it comes to his global warming fantasy, but to the American people, it sounds a lot like a “socialist con job” that will enable this Obama womb reject and his cast of idiots a reason to TAKE OVER the entire financial market.

Far fetched?? Not if you learn about common sense and logic.

Even though only nine banks failed this year, Ryan expects that number to quickly climb with more than 100 banks failing by the end of 2009 saying “I would be quite surprised if we didn’t reach triple digits, most of them being relatively small institutions and they will add up”.

The FDIC insurance fund is going to be depleted by the end of the year thus requiring government bailouts of it’s own. Again, the taxpayers footing the bill and the US Treasury will send the bill to the IRS to begin “repayment” by way of “tax deduction”.

Clinton’s former Secretary of Labor, Robert Reich said “it’s obvious to anyone who follows these numbers that our banking system is very weak right now” and saying “while the situation is not a crisis, it is serious”.

If the lights went out during daylight hours, would that be a crisis?

Profits at 8,500 FDIC insured banks fell 86% in the second quarter of this year. So what happened to those billion dollar profits claimed by B of A?

Here is a puzzling yet scary thought. The FDIC will not publicize the names of the banks on it’s watch list because the theory is that if the list was to be made public, bank customers would pull their money out of the troubled banks causing them to fail.

Okay!! Let’s step back for a second.

Banks and financial institutions and greedy and corrupt mortgage lenders got us into this mess, the government BAILS them out with stimulus and TARP money, they are continuing to fail and distort dollar signs with the help of the government false information network and the FDIC WILL NOT tell bank customers that their bank is on the verge of collapse so that they, the taxpayer, can withdraw THEIR HARD EARNED MONEY out of fear that our wanting and taking our money will CAUSE THE BANKS TO FAIL??????

We will cause the banks to fail??

Pettiness is not one of my attributes, but there is a small yet simpleminded assumption here and it says that Americans themselves would be the downfall of America’s financial mess..

Obama, are you and your womb rejects on crack??? What did you really do when you went down to Mexico?

The banks failed on their own before so if we find out the banks are “continuing” to fail and we go get our money, it will be OUR FAULT??

I didn’t vote for this maniac Obama and I certainly grow happier as days go by knowing that I am not one of the STUPID ones who were simpleminded and dumb enough to vote for him. He didn’t blind side me!!!

Obama, you failed, admit it!! Your stimulus, your TARP and your twisted band aids are coming back to haunt you, aren’t they?? You and your idiots knew not of what you were doing yet you continue as if it is “THEE ONLY WAY”.

The FDIC was created in 1933 during the Great Depression to restore the public’s confidence in the banking system, not the opposite, which would ‘restore the banking systems confidence in the public”.

The FDIC gets it’s money through the financial institutions it insures and not the government.

According to the FDIC, it currently has $50 billion set aside to cover bank failures with about 20% of that going to the Indymac Insurance failure.

The FDIC is supposed to pay depositors immediately when a bank fails and to recover that money paid to depositors, it will sell off the failed bank’s assets. To do that, the FDIC will need a loan from the US Treasury.

“FDIC will need a loan from the US Treasury”. Another taxpayer bailout!!

Word is that if you have less than $100,000 in a bank, then you have nothing to worry about….

Or do you? Let’s analyze.

The Veterans Administration is sending out letters to veterans telling them they have Lou Gehrigs disease or ALS when in fact, they don’t; the VA is botching simple surgeries and at the same time giving veterans Hepatitis and other life threatening ailments and the VA calls it an “error” or “mistake”.

Government “errors and mistakes” is a song and dance routine throughout the government that ultimately disables the thought processing of American’s with common sense and who may rely on true government accountability as a source of needed knowledge.

I can only imagine the government taking your money and giving it to banks to help them out and somewhere in the process the taxpayer must yet again bail a bank out while your other money is sitting somewhere getting lost in a failed bank.

What would that be, an Ooops?? We did it for your own good and future prosperity!!

We did it for America!!!!

The economic failure of today along with the hundreds of billions of the American taxpayers hard earned dollars and the distorted “truths or facts” coming from this absent government and the banks, is literally both treasonous and unethical not to mention fraudulent.

Bailout the banks and leave the little American family to not only foot the tab, but suffer at the hands of credit reporting agencies and those bottom feeding debt collectors.

Credit reporting should cease immediately and until the economy picks up, should not be a relevant factor in any transaction based on the governments manipulation and the corrupt handling of fraudulent reporting by the credit reporting agencies themselves especially due to the dwindling income of Americans.

As for those bottom feeding debt collectors?

Factual stories are beginning to grow wings by the hundreds of thousands about these bottom feeding, womb stench, pieces of human inconvenience. Many stories “make me mad” to say the least.

Our friends and families are losing careers and nice incomes and we let these bottom feeders survive?

Wrong answer!! People are struggling big time and has the government or banks helped them?

No!!!

Either you burn these debt collecting trash pits or you put them on a self pre-payed welfare program. They are not worthy of air in fact, bin Laden has a better chance at becoming an American than they do of having any purpose at all. They are illegal, scamming, thieves, criminal and violent both verbally and physically more so than your local street criminal and get away with it. Harassing the American taxpayer is beginning to sound like yet another issue Real and True Americans are going to take care of on their own. They threaten lives, careers and families. People are getting extremely pissed!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Those of us who write these blogs, talk to many people on a daily basis, so rest assured, the Real and True American’s are talking………….

A worsening economy, banks, socialist government and bottom feeding leeches are the problem!!!!!

“It’s getting to the point”!!!

Let’s Rock!!!!!!

Click here to see file

This week is the end of my summer. it has been an awesome summer and loved every second of it. There has been a lot of new friends, new adventures, new things to do and just a great summer.

BUT…

This is about my week, this week..

Tomorrow my dad and I both have big days!

If you haven’t noticed or heard my dad lost his job and has been looking for a job for six months and this last Sunday Matt S. may have of changed that..

So Matt is giving his sermon on Sunday, which he did great by the way, but he started to talk about two guys who have lost there jobs. One man found a job right away and has become closer to God, the other has been searching for six months and still has no job and his last pay check is coming up soon. but some how this guy has become closer to God more then he ever has, he prayed before he lost his job for God to shake his life up and that’s when he found out that he lost his job. Let me back track a bit, my dad worked at Bank Of America for more then ten years and he was a VP there, i won’t go to details because I’ll screw it up:) so my dad has been looking for a job, hoping to get back at the bank. ANYWAY, once Matt is finished someone handed his wife Debbie a Business Card to give to the guy that does NOT have a job so he did. now Matt did not say what the guy was looking for, where he worked or his name. turns out the card that the girl gave Debbie was at Bank Of America, AND someone my dad worked with that lost there job had gotten hired through this girl, now God truly does good things for those in need, just need patients! Tomorrow my dad is meeting with them to discuss job opportunities. WHOA!!

I will blog tomorrow for mine cause i don’t want to get to excited:)

From ME TO You,

Austin J. Gavin

June 11 (Bloomberg) — House Republican staffers preparing lawmakers for a hearing today said Federal Reserve and Treasury officials overstepped their authority and pressured Bank of America Corp. to complete its Merrill Lynch & Co. purchase.

In a memo written for Republicans on the House Oversight Committee and obtained by Bloomberg News, the staffers cite what they identify as excerpts from internal Fed e-mails to support their stance. The committee issued a subpoena to the Fed June 9 for documents related to the transaction.

via Republican Staff Say E-mails Show Fed Overstepped (Update1) – Bloomberg.com.

By Anthony M. Freed, Information-Security-Resources.com Financial Editor

PCI DSS, the self-regulatory set of guidelines that the payment card industry and retail merchants use to encourage financial information security, may well have entered it’s death throes Tuesday, as evidenced by revealing testimony during the House of Representative’s Committee on Homeland Security hearings.

Why the dire prognosis?

Anyone who has been following the cascade of security failures plaguing the payment card industry in the last year, and punctuated by the still-shrouded breaches at RBS WorldPay (RBS) and Heartland Payment systems (HPY), has to acknowledge that there are major problems with security that need to be addressed pronto.

But the greatest threat to the survival of PCI DSS (Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard) may not be the ever-evolving tactics of the criminal hackers intent on a “big score,” but instead the dysfunctional nature of the relationships between the very parties the standards are meant to serve.

The squabbling and finger pointing displayed during the first quarter of 2009 within the industry itself has resulted in nothing less than a public relations nightmare in my opinion, as major card brands, processors, and merchants each seek to deflect responsibility onto the others.

Someone on the sidelines, intently watching the game, would have to wonder what the heck these people are thinking.

First, RBS WorldPay and Heartland maintain that because they had been PCI DSS compliant at some point before their systems were breached, they can essentially shrug off any any culpability for the security lapses, offering only the caveat that they are doing the best they can with what they have.

Almost simultaneously, the PCI Security Standards Council was staunchly asserting that no company that suffers a breach can be considered PCI compliant – regardless of their being listed as in good standing with the council at the time of the breach.  From Securosis.com:

Businesses that are compliant with PCI standards have never been breached, says Bob Russo, general manager of the PCI Security Standards Council, or at least he’s never seen such a case. Victims may have attained compliance certification at some point, he says, but none has been in compliance at the time of a breach, he says.

Visa (V) echoed this sentiment in an interview with BankInfoSecurity.com:

“We’ve never seen anyone who was breached that was PCI compliant,” Phillips says without specifically naming – or excluding — Heartland. “The breaches that we have seen have involved a key area of non-compliance.”

To add to the confusion, Visa issued statements that RBS WorldPay and Heartland had been belatedly removed from the PCI Compliant list, in what has been widely considered to be merely legal maneuvering to effectively shield themselves from culpability while blocking the only alibi the processors have.

“It’s all legal maneuvering by Visa,” says Gartner security analyst Avivah Litan in an interview with ComputerWorld.com. “This is PCI enforcement as usual: They’re making the rules up as they go.”

This was apparently seen as an opportunity by some Heartland competitors to move in on some of Heartland’s clients, with reports of merchants being warned by other processors that they may be violating PCI compliance by continuing to do business with Heartland, and prompting Heartland to respond with threats of lawsuits.

Then, during Tuesday’s Congressional hearings, representatives of the merchant community, long thought to bear the brunt of security protocol “cram-downs” by the issuing brands, threw their hat into the ring in what now amounts to an industry free-for-all.  From Forbes.com:

Michael Jones, the chief information officer at the retail company Michael’s, testified that the PCI rules were “expensive to implement, confusing to comply with and ultimately subjective both in their interpretation and their enforcement.”

Now bear in mind, all of these factions are supposed on the same team, and all are supposed to be working in unison to continue the evolution of ever more secure systems to thwart the increasingly resourceful criminal hackers.

Is it any wonder that the future of PCI DSS is in question?

And what could possibly be worse than an entire industry at each others throats in the midst of the biggest security problems they have faced to date?

Well, they could make enough of a brouhaha that they attract the attention of lawmakers, as they have succeeded in doing; lawmakers who have regularly demonstrated their intention of late to force industries of all stripes to cede to their “better judgment.”  Also from Forbes.com:

“I’m concerned that as long as the payment card industry is writing the standards, we’ll never see a more secure system,” (Rep. Bennie) Thompson said. “We in Congress must consider whether we can continue to rely on industry-created standards, particularly if they’re inadequate to address the ongoing threat.”

This means that the PCI Security Council, keepers of the PCI DSS flame, have their work cut out for them if they want to remain the chief regulating body for PCI security. Maybe they left these issues to simmer on the back burner for too long, and maybe someone will be looking for a scapegoat.

It’s all uphill now.

During a phone call in early March with Lib de Veyra, VP of emerging technologies at JCB International and recently named Chair of the PCI Security Council, I expressed my concern over the state of relations between the various elements that make up the payment card industry.

I likened the public displays of policy incongruity and the tendency for all interested parties to respond to news of security lapses by rushing to throw each other under the bus, to that of the image of a snake swallowing its own tail.

I expressed concern by offering my opinion that the biggest threat to PCI DSS does not come from the endless supply of criminal hackers the industry will certainly face in perpetuity, but instead comes from the fractured portrait of an industry in crisis, and its inability to effectively manage itself.

That was one long month ago, and opportunity to avert the creation of a new regulatory body to oversee PCI may have already come and gone, which is most unfortunate everyone concerned.

PCI DSS is not broken, but the collective will to make it an effective standard for security just might be.

Anthony is a researcher, analyst and freelance writer who worked as a consultant to senior members of product development, secondary, and capital markets from the largest financial institutions in the country during the height of the credit bubble. Anthony’s work is featured by leading Internet publishers including Reuters, The Chicago Sun-Times, Business Week’s Business Exchange, Seeking Alpha, and ML-Implode.

The Author gives permission to link, post, distribute, or reference this article for any lawful purpose, provided attribution is made to the author and to Information-Security-Resources.com

By Guest Author and Good Friend Scott J. Wilson

Sunday March 22, 2009, Dateline NBC aired a piece called “Inside the Financial Fiasco,” in which Chris Hanson finally takes a break from exposing sexual predators to take a closer look at the current housing mess.

NBC attempts to assign blame for the mortgage meltdown, and also tries to make it seem like they have finally identified the handful people who were the “only ones who knew”  what lay in store for the economy when Wall Street embarked on the derivatives end-run that fueled the crisis.

So let’s go down the list of people that are prime candidates in the vicious circle of blame, and what their role where in the making of this fiasco.

Let’s start at the top.  Back in the mid ‘90’s, The Government loosened credit guidelines and required lenders to make mortgages available to more to minority buyers.

By doing this, they gave the lenders an open check book to write questionable loans, all the while  knowing that they would be able to sell them on the secondary market (Wall Street).

This was the creation of the infamous “Subprime” loans which later morphed into Alt-A and Expanded Approval loans.

Next, let’s look at the  Product Managers who wrote the underwriting guidelines for the toxic  loans known as SISA’s and NINA’s, which required little or no documentation of income and assets.  The SISA loans are highlighted in the Dateline piece.

Do you think that these product managers had no idea that these types of loans may be misused, or did they only see the underlying profit that was possible from billions of dollars of loan fees collected by creating millions of loans that were virtually just ticking time bombs?

Yes, there are some cases where these loans were appropriate, such as for the business owner who had a lot of write offs, or the borrower whose spouse may not have the best of credit, but will nonetheless contribute towards the monthly mortgage payments.

But the types of borrowers who where actually put into these loans were completely unqualified, as mentioned in the NBC piece.

People like Delores Parker Jackson, who took out multiple loans on four condos totaling over $1.3 million with a negative (-$6000) shown on her tax returns.

Mrs. Jackson, who claims to have run a profitable daycare, and says that she is not to blame, but is actually the victim of predatory lending.

REALLY?  She took out multiple mortgages on four different properties totaling over a million dollars with a payment of more than $10k a month, and she claims she had no idea that she could not afford the terms. Now she wants to pretend that she is not culpable, and that the mortgage company committed fraud?

Come on, do seem we that stupid?

Thirdly, let’s look at another “innocent” party:  The CEO’s of all the banks and mortgage companies.

These people should have overseen the product managers and acted as the final line of defense by looking out for the company’s long term interests by saying “Hey, stop!  These loans may be too risky.”

But the CEO’s saw only a “pot of gold” in the form of billions in loan fees, and where slaves to the corporate bottom line.

Do you think that Angelo Mozilo, the former CEO of Countrywide who earned over $400 million during his last five years at the company, had absolutely no idea that SISA and NINA loans with zero money down would backfire?

Chris Hansen attempts to talk to Mr. Mozilo, but to no avail.

Since he quit Countrywide and the mortgage mess started to blow up, Mozilo has been hiding out at his palatial estate in Southern California, ala Howard Hughes.  Chris tried to get the guard at Mr. Mozilo’s gate outside his house to let him in, but was turned away.

Also to blame are the former CEO’s at places like Bear Stern’s and Lehman Brothers, who ended up driving their companies into the ground by buying up these toxic securities.  And none of these guys saw the writing on the wall?

I think they did, but also saw big dollar signs in the racket, and choose to ignore the hazards.

Next up for their heaping of blame are The Borrowers.  I was an LO for 15 yrs, and used Countrywide as a purchaser for many of my loans.

I knew that some of my borrowers were “less than qualified,” but the underwriting said to “make the loan.”

Like when I would be working for a builder, and a borrower would come to me and asked what loan amount they qualified for, my reply often was, “How much can you afford?”

I told them that I could tell them all day how much they can and cannot get approved for, but only they could tell me how much they really afford.

I could tell them on paper or with calculator that you could qualify to pay,  but only the borrower could tell me if they could actually maintain that payment.

I cannot tell you how many times I was told by borrowers, “Don’t worry about me affording it.  You just write that mortgage.”

This is where I move on to include the next culprit in this mess,  The Loan Officers.

How many LO’s wrote loans for people that they knew would end up in foreclosure?

Many borrowers who I turned down for a mortgage would come back to me later to say, “See, I knew I could get approved.  Thanks for nothing.”

At the height of the bubble, there were so countless mortgage brokers who were willing to do anything to write a loan and collect a fee.

They would falsify the numbers to make them work if they had to.

In the Dateline piece, they showcase a woman who was employed as a personal trainer, and who claimed to of told the LO at People’s Choice that she only made $1600/mo.

She was approved for a $259k loan.

Even after she was told that the payment would be over $2100/mo, she figured that she would just have her sister move in and help with the payment.

Do you think that the LO at People’s Choice had any idea that she may NOT be able to make the payment on this house? When Chris Hansen looked at the original paperwork, it stated that she made $7300/mo, which surprised the woman.

She claims she never provided that figure to the LO.

How many LO’s committed fraud because the commissions that they were going to make on each loan they closed could be well into the tens-of-thousands of dollars?

Even though my job was commissioned based, I only made loans if I had some degree of certainty that the borrower had both the ability to pay the mortgage payment and that they completely understood why I was giving them a SISA or NINA loan product.

I did not want a former borrower hunting me down in the parking lot some night after work because I put them in a loan that that left them flat broke.

Next in line is a major player, one who no one seems to put much blame on or even mention much, The Appraiser’s. I believe these guys  had a huge impact on the housing explosion, and no one seems to want to bring them up.

As the appraisers continued to inflate the values of the properties, the mortgage companies continued to write mortgages to cover the obscene appraisals.

I knew that if a borrower told me that they were short on funds to close, I could call the appraiser and ask him to “bump up” the value of the property a bit, so that I could give the borrower the money cover closing costs.

This was considered a legitimate practice because real estate only increases in value, remember? But in reality, the value of that house did not go up $5k in the 2-3 weeks since they had done the actual appraisal.

I also found out the hard way how much of an “opinion” an appraisal really was.

Prior to working for the builder, I worked for a short time as a mortgage broker.  I only did one loan at the place. , and it was for a gentleman who was doing some renovations on his house, but did not have enough money to finish the project.

Less than a year earlier, the value of the house came in at $85k.  When he wanted to do another cash-out refinance a year later, but the new appraisal came in again at $85k.  So when I went to my boss and told him that I did not have the value to support the loan, he handed me a business card and said, “Call him.”

Two weeks later, I had an appraisal for $115k, enough to cover the loan.

Was there that much movement in the values of the house?  Did it really go up $20k in three weeks, or did the new appraiser just want more business?

What do you think?  I know when I worked for one of the big mortgage companies and did a ton of refi’s, every time I had to put an initial value of a home on an application (which typically came from the borrower) nine times out of ten, the appraisal came back with the exact same value.

Curious.

Another big part of the mess, the people who were supposed to catch any fraud or mistakes, were The Underwriters.

They were the final check points in the mortgage process, and when they were presented with a SISA loan that showed that a “house cleaner” made $12k/mo, they should have sounded the alarm.

Like the appraisers, the underwriters are merely mentioned in the piece on Dateline.

Ilene Lanacano, who worked for “People’s Choice,” says that when she brought up some of these problems with the questionable loans, she was often overruled by the CEO of the company.

She states that she was often offered “incentives” by loan officers (money, jewelry, even a car) to approve loans.  Ilene says that she never took any of these incentives.

She also claimed that there was harassment and intimidation if you did not approve loans, such as flattened tires and physical threats.

Ilene finally left “People’s Choice” for a consulting firm whose business was to analyze the loans to be pooled in Mortgage Backed Securities (MBS’s).  When she raised some flags, she ended up getting in trouble by management.

Next, let’s look to good old Wall Street. You would think that one of the supposed guru’s of Wall Street could have seen the possibility that at least some of these loans were destine fail.  But  they too, only saw the bottom line, and they sold these MBS to everyone:  investors, pension funds, municipalities and other countries.

And then there is China, who bought up trillions of dollars in MBS in an attempt to control the US.  By owning all these MBS, China has a huge stake in our mortgage meltdown.

They were only briefly mentioned in the “Dateline” piece, and no real repsonsibility was levied on them.  If China had not been so greedy, there wouldn’t have such a demand for MBS, which would have cut down the toxic loans being written.

And the Chinese are smart, shouldn’t they have seen some of the signs?

Next ones to heap some blame on are the Bond Rating Agencies, such as Standard and Poors, who was also briefly mentioned in NBC’s piece.

As Dateline explained, they were hired to give credit ratings to these MBS, which are supposed to indicate their level of risk to investors. “AAA” was the highest rating that they could give a security, and 80% of MBS received that top stamp of approval.

They suggested that most MBS would perform well, despite the fact that the agencies did not have any historical data to back the ratings up.  Richard Gufliota of S&P, stated that they were so over inundated with securities to rate that most were not examined to the extent that they should have been.

It should also be mentioned that they made their money in volume too.  More quantity over quality.

Finally, a lesser acknowledged culprit of this financial fiasco is The Media itself.

If it wasn’t for the greed of the media (TV, Radio and Newsprint), rolling out with advertisement after advertisement for these mortgage companies and their products, borrowers would not have been so encouraged to accept some of these toxic loan.

In years leading up to this mess, there wasn’t a commercial break that did not produce a mortgage ad.

Often advertised were the No Closing Cost, Stated Income, No Income Verified, and so forth.

There wasn’t a Radio host in the nation who didn’t have at least one mortgage company in their back pocket paying them to be their spokesperson.

Did any of them look into the products that they were pitching to their listeners?  Nope.  I think they just laughed all the way to the bank.

And what is strange about the media’s role, is that I have yet to see anyone try to add them into the equation.  Now, all you hear out of radio talk show hosts  spewed crap about how everyone else is to blame.  None have come forward to say, “Hey, I guess I had a hand in it too.”

All in all, it is going to be a vicious circle of blame.

There is plenty of blame to go around, and I think when it comes down to it, we can sum it all up with one little word:  “GREED;” the Greed of the Government, the greed of the Product Managers, the greed of the CEO’s, the greed of the borrowers, the greed of the Loan officers, the greed of the Appraisers, the greed of the Underwriters, the greed of Wall Street, the greed of China, the greed of the Bond Raters, and greed of the media.

Bank of America is using Bailout dollars to provide incentives to see the new Dreamworks picture “Monsters vs. Aliens.”

Check out the coupon here…

Why is this happening?

Probably because the president of Dreamworks pictures is none other than Jeffrey Katzenberg.
Read

By Guest Author and Good Friend Scott J. Wilson

Is 60 Minutes the new propaganda department of the FDIC, or what?  Again, they drop the ball in their coverage of the mortgage crisis, leaving viewers more misinformed than ever.

My esteem for the fabled news show is quickly diminishing.

“Reporter” Scott Pelley had a piece on 60 Minutes on Sunday (03/08/09), in which he tries to comfort us by examining a bank being taken over on February 27, 2009, Heritage Community Bank in Chicago.

By showing the inside workings of a take over, “60 Minutes” (I think) was trying to put our minds at ease by showing how smoothly it goes.

But this is a bank of only 5 branches, with a total 12,000 deposits worth only $200 million. Not pocket change, but not any where in the same ballpark or even league as a big bank like B of A (BAC) or Chase (C).

In the story, they state that when Indy Mac (IDMCQ) went down it held close to $11 billion.  The FDIC levies premiums that they charge banks  to insure the deposits, and put the funds into a reserve for such failures.

The FDIC states that there were 25 closings in 2008, but as of the first two months 2009, there have  already 1been 6 closings.  The FDIC estimates that they will need $65 billion to cover closings over the next five years.

Let’s do the math:

-$65 billion over then next five years = $13 billion per year.

-If HCB is an average bank, don’t think that with five branches is that big = $200 million.

-That means they can handle 65 closings a year of these small banks.

So that being said, what happens if another Indy Mac goes down?

According to Sheila Bair (Chairman of the FDIC) the FDIC will never go broke.  It will always be backed by the government.

What does Bair think?  That the fed will just print some more money and give to her?  That doesn’t sound so good.

Now I have done some investigating of my own:   According to this piece, there are three things that the FDIC can do when a bank fails:

-They can close the bank and pay the depositors.

-They can close the bank as it was and run it themselves.

-They can sell the bank (as was the case in the HCB in this story.)

In the story, Heritage was sold to MB Financial (MBF) and things went on as normal they next day (Saturday) after the FDIC take over.  The FDIC paid MB $3.5 million dollars to take over Heritage.  The FDIC also insures that if any loan by HCB that goes bad in the near future will re-reimbursed up to 80% of the loan loss.

Okay, so this situation seems to have a happy ending.

But let’s say that a bank fails and the FDIC fails to get a suitable buyer, what happens if they don’t want to run it and they close it down.

I brought this question to the attention of my banker at Regions Bank (RF).  He informed me that the FDIC has up to TWO years to pay depositors their claim.  Yes it is insured, but if you don’t have access to your money for up to two years, what good is it going to do you?

What about the people who live pay check to pay check?  Or the seniors that have a limited cash flow and everything they own is in that one bank that went under?

Once I heard this from my banker at Regions, my wife and I decided to diversify in three banks.  This way if one goes under and no one buys it, I will have a back up.  We also took some cash and put it into our safe.

1. Why, do you say or wonder?  Well, lets to some thinking here:
2. Who, if anybody, remembers what happened during the depression?  Who really lived it?  Answer:  Seniors.
3. Who has some of the most assets?  Answer:  Seniors.
4. If there is a massive scare and there is a run on the banks, who do you think will be the first to come to the bank and withdraw all of their savings?  Answer:  Seniors.

And last, how many “average Joe” accounts would it take to equal what one senior couple would have in their account?  Answer:  I don’t know, but I know it is probably at least 10 to 1, probably close to 20 to 1 or higher.

So this is where we and the FDIC must be careful.

Keeping the confidence in the people who have the most at stake…seniors.  If there is a run on the banks, you can bet that the seniors will be the first ones in line to get their cash.

In the “60 Minutes” piece, they in fact show a senior citizen come in with an empty brief case in order to withdraw all his money.  Nothing  in this story examines how seniors can make or break this mess with run on the banks.

I have never been involved with a bank that was being taken over, but I am sure it is not as nice as the way they show it in this piece.

Heritage had been in business for 45 yrs and probably didn’t take some of the most risky loans such as the Chases (JPM), B of A’s and Well’s (WFC), but they get bailed out where these small banks seem to be just kicked to wayside.

One other thing that is brought up is when Pelley brings to the attention of Bair about what would happen if a big bank goes under and why they get bailed out and the small banks don’t, she suggests that we need to legislate the size of the big banks.

Make it so that they cannot exceed a certain limit to insure the fact that they cannot get too big and fail.

Bair says that the FDIC can and will not fail, what will happen if a Chase or B of A goes under.  I think that the FDIC would have a hard time handling one of those.

They won’t be able to just “print money” to clean up the mess without creating another snowball effect on the value of the dollar, let alone the consumer confidence.  That is something that Pelley should have investigated instead of how nice it was when this little five branch bank failed.

Well I guess that bailout money is finally trickling down to the little guy.  Bank of America is giving away free admission to over 70 museums nationwide the first weekend of every month.  All you have to do is show your Bank of America ATM card and you’re in for free.  Here’s the list of supported museums in New York, to see the rest of the country click here.

Bronx Zoo
Jewish Museum
Metropolitan Museum of Art
New York Aquarium
New York Hall of Science
International Center of Photography

Bank of America has been busy.  Since snapping up Merrill and Countywide, the company has quite a bit to manage.  I’ve highlighted Ken Lewis, CEO of Bank of America, before but here’s the latest CEO interview with Lewis remarking how Merrill has been a “star” and how “Everything we thought is playing out” with the Jan. 1 purchase of the company.  Everything?  Well.  Then get my purchase for a condo done, Mr. Lewis!  Here’s the interview.

To hear the credit card companies tell it, curbing their predatory lending practices i.e, raising interest rates on pre-existing balances, and implementing rules allowing consumers a reasonable amount of time to make their credit card payments is no easy feat.

“Compliance with the new rules,” wrote American Express’s President of the Consumer Card Services Group Jud Linville in response to Menendez, “is an enormously complex undertaking that will take us some time to fully implement. Because the new requirements are so tightly interrelated, it would be difficult to implement some of the rules in isolation of the others.”

Citi Cards Executive VP John Carey said : “A radical transformation of the industry business model will be required to sustain industry health under the new regulations… None of these changes can be made hastily if the industry is to act prudently and responsibly.”

But what would be imprudent or irresponsible about deciding immediately — today — that there will be no increases on pre-existing balances, or that monthly statements will be mailed at least 21 days before the payment due date (two requirements of the new rules)? What about those changes are “so tightly interrelated” to the other new rules that they couldn’t happen “in isolation” without the whole house of credit cards tumbling down?

Yet the bankers warn of dire consequences. “It would be impractical,” according to Citi’s Carey, “to implement new rules immediately without imposing significant risk to the systems, not the least of which might be serious inconvenience for our cardmembers.”

You mean more seriously inconvenient than cardmembers having their interest rate jacked up to 29.99% (or higher) if they miss a single payment?

Capital One President Ryan Schnieder pointed that the Fed’s own Director of Consumer and Community Affairs, Sandra Braunstein, said that “considering everything that needs to be done and the interconnectedness of the different rules, [18 months] is a very reasonable time period. In fact, 18 months is a challenge.”

18 months?  Cnsidering how many families are currently struggling with the “challenge” of making ends meet, and how many will sink further into credit card debt between now and July 2010, it doesn’t make sense to — as the president put it in another context — “…make the perfect the enemy of the essential.”

Card members falling behind need relief, and they need it now.  Those changes that can be made now, should be made now (some credit card companies are already in compliance with a number of the new rules; and doing so “in isolation” didn’t destroy the industry).

What’s more, the rules the Fed adopted in December had been proposed in draft form in May 2008 — so it’s not as if the banks hadn’t been forewarned. But something tells me they spent the seven months between May and December trying to derail the new regulations as opposed to getting a head start on getting their ships in order.

Congress needs to make sure the credit card companies are not dragging their feet (the 2nd thing they do best, the first is lying) and “passing reform into law,” as  Senator Menendez puts it, “is the most effective way to do it.”

It’s a compelling argument, one raised at a National Press Club luncheon last week when a questioner asked Fed Chair Bernake.  ”Isn’t there something very wrong when banks can borrow at the Fed’s window at less than one percent, but are charging credit card holders interest rates as high as 29 percent?”

Genius (not), Fed Reserve Chairman Bernake didn’t directly take on the point about cheap money for banks but high interest for customers. But, in his letter to Sen. Menendez, Capital One’s Schneider argues that credit cards are typically not financed by money received by the Fed but by packaged credit card debt sold to Wall Street as securities — so the drop in the prime rate has not eased the burden on lenders. “Capital One’s funding in the securitization market,” says Scheider, “is not tied to the Prime rate or any similar index… Thus, notwithstanding decreases in the federal funds rate, when credit losses rise as they have done so dramatically, pricing for our market-based funding rises as well.”

What he doesn’t say is that the market for “credit card receivables” is another example of Wall Street creativity gone awry — and that the hunger for ever-greater profits motivated many credit card companies to offer cards to risky borrowers and to allow customers to accumulate higher and higher amounts of debt. The greater the debt, the more there was to sell off to investors — consequences be damned. So it’s more than a little disingenuous for the bankers to now be blaming “the securitization market” for the credit industry’s woes.

Banks lent irresponsibly and marketed over-aggressively and are now asking their customers — even their “non-delinquent” customers — to pay the price…..and while they’re at it – hand over billions in tax dollars to bail “them” out!

(Click to Enlarge)

During Heartland Payment Systems (HPY) quarterly Earnings conference call, CFO and President Robert Baldwin revealed that Heartland is indeed under SEC investigation, though the details of exactly why they are being investigated have not been released.

Company President and Chief Financial Officer Robert Baldwin Jr. disclosed the investigations during Heartland’s quarterly conference call with investigators (sic) Tuesday, saying that the SEC had launched an informal inquiry into the company and that there is also a related investigation by the Department of Justice. The U.S. Department of the Treasury’s Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC), which regulates national banks and their service providers, has launched an inquiry, as has the FTC, he said.

Reached Wednesday, a Heartland spokesman could not say why the SEC was investigating the company.

However, the investigation may relate to stock trades made by Heartland Chairman and CEO Robert Carr after Visa notified Heartland of suspicious activity on Oct. 28, 2008. According to insider trade filings, Carr sold just under US$8 million worth of stock between Oct. 29 and the day the breach was disclosed. Heartland’s stock was trading in the $15-to-$20 range for most of these transactions, but it dropped following the breach disclosure. It closed Wednesday at $5.49.

This is trenchant to my January 29 analysis about the possibility that knowledge of the 2008 information breach may have influenced stock trades by Heartland CEO Robert O. Carr.  The article prompted an email response direct to me from Heartland representatives in which  they categorically denied any illicit trading activity on the part of Carr:

At the time of this announcement, Mr. Carr was not under any trading restrictions pursuant to the company’s insider trading policy and was not in possession of any material non-public information concerning the company. Under this 10b5-1 plan, programmed sales of company stock were made on Mr. Carr’s behalf, and he had no discretion regarding the timing or other aspects of those sales.

Although he was not required to do so, Mr. Carr terminated his 10b5-1 when the company confirmed the security breach it disclosed in the company’s press release of January 20, 2009. As has been reported, Heartland first learned of a potential problem from the card associations on October 28th of last year, well after the announcement of this 10b5-1 plan. Heartland categorically denies that Mr. Carr was aware of a potential security breach at the time he adopted his trading plan.

As CEO of the sixth largest payment card processor, I would hope that Carr would at times possess some non-public information on the company he built, but that is a topic for a different discussion on the overall CEO performance levels and our failing economy.

Here is the time line of the breach and Carr’s trades so far:

May 14, 2008:  Breach reported to have began May 20, 2008 Carr Makes first stock sale of the year, 2695 shares August (first week), 2008:  CEO Robert Carr’s 10b5-1 is proposed August 8, 2008:  Board approves 10b5-1 plan August 8 – August 14, 2008:  Carr makes six separate sales of stocks totalling 60,000 shares August 19, 2008:  Breach reported to have ended August 28, 2008:  Carr sells 80,000 shares September 3, 2008:  Carr sells 80,000 shares September 17, 2008:  Carr sells 80,000 shares October 15, 2008:  Carr sells 80,000 shares October 28, 2008:  Visa and MasterCard notify Heartland of problems; Carr sells 80,000 shares November 6, 2008:  Carr sells 80,000 shares November 20, 2008:  Carr sells 80,000 shares December 11, 2008:  Carr sells 80,000 shares December 26, 2008:  Carr sells 42,900 shares January 7, 2009:  Carr sells 80,000 shares January 12, 2009: Carr suspends his 10b5-1 stock selling plan January 20, 2009:  Breach Announced Sources:  (http://www.secform4.com/insider-trading/1144354.htm) (http://www.2008breach.com/)

Revelations that the SEC is investigating the stock trades comes on top of class action lawsuits spurred by the breach, as well as a steady decline in stock price.

Heartland has also been hit with a class-action lawsuit relating to the breach, which was publicly disclosed on Jan. 20. “We may, in the future, be subjected to other governmental inquiries and investigations,” Baldwin said during the call. “We intend to vigorously defend any claims asserted against us.”

An unofficial transcript of Heartland’s call can be found here.

The Heartland breach, which has now affected more than 500 banks across the country, leaving an untold number of consumers at risk of financial identity theft and Heartland stakeholders with a loss exceeding 50% in about one month’s time.

There is also another “undisclosed” breach which we are hearing about.  The breach itself has already been confirmed by Visa, and it is possible the breach will exceed Heartland in size.

Our team has been predicting that 2009 will be the year that InfoSec moves to the forefront of the economic crisis with Homeland Security implications.  We believe the somewhat obscure issue will be as familiar to the American public as the notorious subprime and pay option ARMs have in the last year or two.

Much like the meltdown of the mortgage industry, the revelations of lax governance in the handling of sensitive and private data will likely shock the public and the business community alike, and those revelations are bound to come all too painfully slow, especially for shareholders.

The data loss debacle at Heartland highlights the fact that the failure to secure information is the next major shareholder derivative, director and officer liability, regulatory, consumer product safety, and class-action issue to impact our economy.

More updates to follow.

More Heartland News:

Heartland Now Under SEC Investigation

Another Payment Card Processor Hacked

Heartland Breach: Fraud Activity Reported

Heartland Update: Reps Respond to Questions

Did Heartland CEO Make Insider Trades?

Anthony is a researcher, analyst and freelance writer who worked as a consultant to senior members of product development, secondary, and capital markets from the largest financial institutions in the country during the height of the credit bubble. Anthony’s work is featured by leading Internet publishers including Reuters, The Chicago Sun-Times, Business Week’s Business Exchange, Seeking Alpha, and ML-Implode.

The Author gives permission to link, post, distribute, or reference this article for any lawful purpose, provided attribution is made to the author and to Information-Security-Resources.com

All defendants defaulted under their respective lease agreements by failing to make required monthly payments. In 2004 Frontier, Liberty’s successor in interest, filed suits against Acevedo, Bishop’s, Vista, and JMM. In each case it sought damages for breach of the lease agreement. The defendants failed to file answers or otherwise appear, and in March 2005 Frontier requested that default judgments be entered against all defendants.

http://www.precydent.com/citation/IA+App/05-601

To save you from the legal gibberish, Frontier is going after people some 8 years after they supposedly defaulted on Liberty leases – in reality, Liberty screwed all of these people out of their money on an ATM leasing scam.  The marketer of the scam went bankrupt, the organization that designed the machines, Tidel went public and members of its board got filthy rich! (See more below.)  The judge threw Frontier out on their asses as they smelled what they were trying to do.  Good Job Ed McConnell!  I’ve heard of personal injury lawyers, but not law firms that chase victims and kick ‘em while they’re down!

So why the importance?

Well, you see Liberty was one of many leasing companies involved in a scam that went like this:  (taken from a court document - not from the press)

Credit Card Company (“CCC”) is an equipment vendor that developed an aggressive distribution program selling, installing and servicing ATM’s. CCC’s market included convenient stores, gas stations, and other similar businesses.  Appellee and CCC entered into a “Vendor Finance Program and Remarketing Agreement” whereby CCC would sell, distribute and service ATM’s and appellee would provide only financing to qualified CCC customers. Pursuant to their agreement, CCC would obtain all of the credit information from the customers buying the equipment, as well as their signatures on the credit applications and lease agreements.

So CCC made a deal with NCR and Tidal to sell their ATM machines (read about NCR and Tidel here.)  Tidal was obviously involved as executives in the company ( used the inflated revenues to make themselves rich.  They preyed upon unknowing store owners by coercing them into signing a lease for $269/month for 60 months ($18,000) for a machine that cost approximately $2,000.

The saga continued. Three members of its Board, including Rash, filed Form 4 reports with the Securities and Exchange Commission showing open-market purchases ofthe company’s common stock in October. Clay purchased 40,000 shares, and Rash and Raymond P. Landry purchased 10,000 shares each.At that time, Tidel also reported that Britton, who had served as a member of the Board of Directors since 1990, had tendered his resignation on Oct. 11. Britton had acquired 100,000 Tidel shares for $81,500 through the exercise of warrants on July 12, 2000. He then sold 133,800 shares for a profit of $1,556,494 over the next 12 days. A month earlier, Rash had sold 250,000 shares for a profit of $2,917,839 over an eight-day period beginning on June 13. Levenick also sold 105,000 shares from June 14 to 16 for $1,246,070 in proceeds. But Tidel claimed that at the time of the stock sales, no one in the company anticipated future problems with CCC. Let’s wait a moment for the laughter to die down. Read More here

Then CCC went bankrupt after selling all of the leasing paper.  Liberty was one of the original leasing companies in bed with CCC.  With this type of arrangement, CCC probably got a big chunk of money from the sale of the paper, walked away bankrupt and the left all the marks to the predatory behaviors of the leasing companies.

Fast forward to 2005 – NCR who was in bed with Tidel on the ATM deal, bought them out hiding more of their dirty little secrets.

NCR agreed to acquire the ATM business of Tidel Technologies in 2005; the deal closed early the following year. – Hoovers (from NCR history page)

Frontier Leasing is digging up every contract it can find and suing the holders for every dime it can get.  Search on “frontier leasing” and Iowa and see how many cases are out there in the public domain.  Not to mention hundreds that haven’t yet made it to the light.

Summary:  Today’s framework provides little to no protection for the little guy.  With the cost of legal representation (due diligence added to hourly wages exceeding $200/hour, there is no affordable option for defense).  With corporate bankrolls supporting the top legal firms and lobbyists on Capitol Hill, once again the behemoth is going to win. Look at GM, Chrysler, B of A and Citigroup!  So how is the little guy to make it?  Get bloody angry and call your congressman, your attorney general and make it known that you’ve been taken! (Chances are, they have heard from others and your voice might be enough to put the AG over the edge to stand up for what’s right in his state.  After all, if you go out of business, he loses tax money, jobs and all types of other revenues he relies on coming from small business, not big business!) If we lay down, the lion doesn’t go away!  He bites!.  But if we huddle up with our tusks outward, we can fend him off!  What little bit of corporate America that was trustworthy (banks, insurance companies, Wall Street) as we know it is gone.  It’s time to stand up and scream “We’ve had enough and we’re not going to take it anymore!”

]]> http://mikesdailyblog.com/2009/02/23/bank-of-america-sucks/ Mon, 23 Feb 2009 17:57:34 +0000 Mike Martinez http://mikesdailyblog.com/2009/02/23/bank-of-america-sucks/

I hate B of A. I hate their banking practices, I hate their policies, and I especially hate their customer service. I had a horrible experience with them about 7 or 8 years ago that involved me being treated differently by a manager in a branch because of how I was dressed. Here it is all these years later and I decided to give them a try again because they have a branch right across the street from my post office. They misapplied and incorrectly dated payments to my credit card, then tried to hit me with a bunch of ridiculous fees. Getting them to admit their mistakes and then credit me the erroneous charges has taken literally hours of my day haggling and arguing with different managers. I think they intentionally try and trip people up so they charge these various fees and often times people just give up or don’t want to fight for their case so they wind up collecting this money from people. I’ve closed my bank accounts with Bank of America and I will never, ever use them again. First change I get to transfer my balance on my credit card I am going and I’m going to close that account to. Stay away from Bank of America…they’re borderline thieves and they don’t deserve people’s hard-working dollars and business.