Bank of America reaches $16 billion mortgage fraud settlement

Bank of America (BoA) is finalizing a settlement with the Department of Justice (DOJ) over claims that the bank palmed off worthless mortgages to investors, according to the Wall Street Journal.

In the lead-up to the financial crisis, BoA and its subsidiaries sold hundreds of billions of dollars of toxic mortgage assets to investors. The bank knew that the actual value of these mortgage- backed securities was just a fraction of what it sold them for.

News outlets are reporting on the unprecedented price tag affixed to the BoA agreement, reportedly somewhere between $16 and $17 billion. In fact, Bank of America will pay a fraction of this fine. As the Washington Post noted in 2012, “Corporations can write off any portion of a settlement that is not paid directly to the government as a penalty or fine for violation of the law. A majority of the settlements that federal regulators announced in the past year include some form of restitution that is eligible for a tax deduction.” According to the Journal’s anonymous source, $9 billion of the amount is tax deductible.

This truly is just sickening. These monsters are getting away with destroying ordinary folks life's because they are rich. RICH- A get out of jail free card. To find out that more than half of the fine will be tax deductible is just another kick to the groin. I truly despair at times!


rinf.com...

And to whom do these fines go? Can somebody tell me that please? To who does Barclays pay their LIBOR fine to?
Bet your bottom dollar, or pound,that it doesn't recompense their customers that they fleeced in the first place.

Rainbows
Jane

Another case of criminal behaviour, and nobody goes to jail. Sorry, we promise to be good, and then it's back to the same schemes and a large one at the club to celebrate!

Any single person committing fraud on scales a fraction of what the banks get away with gets a jail sentence, and possibly asset seizure and fines as well. The banks, as we see time and time again, simply agree to pay a fine, without having to admit any wrongdoing, and thus nobody goes to jail. Even when they do admit guilt, it'll be some lowly staffer that carries the can, not the exec level guys. The very idea of "justice" is therefore a farce!

a reply to: angelchemuel

It says in the article the fines go into the US treasury who then give it back to the Banksters via bailouts etc.

Bet that just made your day.

a reply to: Britguy

Your right the Justice system is a farce. Why should we concede power to it when they don't ?

a reply to: DrunkYogi




But thank you
Rainbows
Jane

The gov't could have just paid off every mortgage in the country and spent less money. It would have at least preserved the property rights of the american citizens! Then the banking system and wall street could have been left to clear out the securities that were based on those mortgages and we could have seen just how much fraud was involved there!

But no there was a moral danger in that! I mean we can't go around paying the debt for people who made more debt than they could afford to pay back now could we??

Well obviously there was a moral danger to bailing the banks and wall street out also. And well it's also obvious that the banks and wall street didn't learn anything from their experience since they are back to doing the same danged thing that got us into this mess! Only thing they accomplished was they put the ownership of many many homes into the pockets of the fed and gov't.. which quite possibly is what they wanted!

they spread these bogus securities that were fraudulent from beginning to end around the globe! they sit in our retirement funds, our insurance companies, our local governments, in foreign governments, and god only knows where else!

a reply to: dawnstar

Don't forget the additional debt, foisted upon the taxpayers, of the money created to bailout the banks. Those of us who are/were debt free were then on the hook, through additional taxation and other means, to pay it back. All the while, those who created it carried on pulling in their astronomical salaries and bonuses!

A clear case of private profit, socialized debt, which flies in the face of capitalism, where those institutions getting into trouble are allowed to fail. It makes me laugh when I hear people talk about the "capitalist" system we have in the West and how it trumps everything else, yet we clearly see the taxpayer being tapped to prop up criminally negligent financial institutions. That sure ain't capitalism!

a reply to: angelchemuel

My pleasure.

a reply to: Britguy

not to mention all the people who've lost jobs in the failing economy it helped to create.
people who very well could have paid their bills if the economy didn't take a nosedive and leave them out in the cold.
who suddenly found themselves somehow having to not only having to pay their mortgage but also paying for the repercussions of the gov't buying their mortgages from the banks to bail out the banks !

it's not capitalism it's fascism!

a reply to: dawnstar

It all seems contrived. Part of some bigger plan i suspect.

a reply to: DrunkYogi

I think I read that obamacare has it so that if they help you out with your healthcare that it will give them the right to seize enough of your assets to offset the cost. not sure if it is true or not...
they are after the actual property I think. The land which if I had my guess they would bulldoze at a later time and rebuild more modern cities more fitting for their plans.
that would be my guess and well it's about the most noblest idea that I can come up with. the rest kind of just paints too bleak of a picture.

a reply to: DrunkYogi

Anything they can't write-off will be passed on to consumers in increased charges. Anything they can write-off will be passed onto to taxpayers as increases in taxes or reductions in services. The earth and society are closed systems at present, so any fines resulting from so-called justice is simply the increase or loss of wealth from one place to another. Then there is the infinite consumer/resource model on top of that with fiat currency. You can't have an infinite system residing within a finite system without system failure.

Cheers - Dave

a reply to: dawnstar

Yes! It looks like a land grab to me also. The Banks will end up owning most and people will have to move into Cities where they will be easier to control. Part of Agenda 21 ?

a reply to: bobs_uruncle

A land grab and money grab ? Greed knows no bounds!

Corporations have the same rights of people, but some apparently have more rights than others.

It should have been 16 billion plus 16 years hard labor on a chain gang to all the people involved. Seeing how they got over 50 billion from the government the 16 is small change.

It`s absurd to say BOA is paying the settlement,it`s absurd to fine any large company because the people who will be paying the fine are the customers.
The BOA executives will still get their inflated salaries and bonuses as usual,BOA will still keep making profits,the real losers are the customers who will have to pay higher fees for BOA services so that money can be used to pay the fine.
You could make the executives pay the fine out of their personal income and assets but they will just give themselves 16 million worth of bonuses next year.There can never be any accountability for corporate executives who lie, steal, cheat and break the law, they will always come out on top.

Before you guys get to pissy with a Bank of America. Dont forget Countrywide sold the junk and BA was forced to purchase CW the day before it defaulted. Dont put it all on BA.

So the majority of the money goes to the GOVERNMENT. The gov't who used TAXPAYER money to bail out these f**kin crooks, after the crooks robber the PEOPLE in the first place.

And not a single one of them get their homes back!!! The bank's come and take possession, then RESELL the home yet again....

AMAZING

And people say the concept of sovereign citizen is a joke....

The longer I live, the more I believe the natives were right in their understanding of property rights. NO ONE owns the planet! We simply live on her surface.