Here are the latest bank capital rule statements from FDIC, Fed, and OCC.

ZeroHedge ran a post from OfTwoMinds today with eight steps to fix the economy. Among the recommendations are requiring all banks to mark MBS, real estate and all other assets to market daily/weekly and imposing massive fines for mark-to-market misrepresentations. Doing so would mean writing off at least $5.8 trillion of fantasy “value,” most of [...]

The mortgage mess and great recession here in the U.S. led to a great deal of additional banking regulation. Regulations are made by people who usually do not have enough awareness of long-term consequences, so nobody really knows how these regulations will impact banking, the mortgage business, and the economy. And on an international scale, [...]

Just attended the MBA’s Secondary Marketing conference. The mood was decidedly upbeat. It seemed well attended with the usual array of investors such as Fannie, Freddie, Wells, Bank of America, Chase, CitiMortgage, PHH, SunTrust, and so forth, along with the usual cadre of vendors. There was definitely a hint that: (a) firms are still grappling [...]

On the eve of being enacted, in a surprise move, Senator Dodd called on Congress to rescind the Dodd-Frank legislation, saying the rules and regulations not only has ground residential lending to a halt, but has, and will, also cost the consumer billions of dollars. “The other night it just ‘clicked’ that all of this [...]

This Friday, April 1 is Finreg implementation day for the mortgage industry. What bank lobbyists sold to Dodd and Frank as consumer protection is a clever way to increase profits: the new rules change almost nothing about banks’ secondary market and trading operations, and mandate a new loan agent compensation model that gives banks the [...]

Here’s a good primer on the Qualified Residential Mortgage (QRM) regulatory initiative that requires loan originators to retain at least 5% of any mortgages they securitize so they have some skin in the game. Interestingly, some mortgage banks are cutting QRM deals now where they’re retaining more like 8% of their holdings, and in some [...]

Now that the dust has settled from the election, what did it all mean for the mortgage consumer? Historically Republicans are reputed to be more “pro-business”. Republicans may try to rein in regulators implementing a sweeping overhaul of financial rules and press for a smaller federal role in the mortgage market. This will be interesting, [...]

For those who don’t truly know what’s going on with financial reform, we offer this simple analogy using beloved movie The Hangover. While the market has been shaking off its post credit boom hangover with a new credit boom (hair of the dog is the best cure, right?), Senator Chris Dodd drafted financial reform legislation [...]

Half of Nation’s 7800 Credit Unions Reported 2009 Losses The National Credit Union Administration (NCUA) approved a $1 billion charge to pay for the corporate credit union bailout. This follows last year’s charge of $1.1 billion, $337 million of which went to the corporate bailout and the remainder to replenish reserves for the National Credit [...]