Posts Tagged ‘bailout’

ATM thieves turn tables on banking industry with $45M cybercrime

Tuesday, May 14th, 2013
Computer hand

Computer hackers, like banks, manage to get away with financial malfeasance.

It used to be that the underworld was where you would expect to find ATM thieves. But the world has changed, and with it the way that bank crimes are being committed.

Take for example news reports about a “global posse” of cyber thieves who made off with some $45 million from bank ATMs in 26 countries in what authorities are calling a first-of-its kind cybercrime heist.

Armed not with guns, but with laptops, this group of hackers managed not only to get into the computer networks of financial companies in the U.S. and India, but also to do away with the ATM cash withdrawal limits on prepaid debit cards.

The good news here is that no individuals lost money. Instead, the crooks plundered money held by banks.

Just seven people have been indicted. An eighth, considered to be the ringleader, was found dead in the Dominican Republic.

It was a sophisticated crime that essentially turned the tables on the banking industry – which over the years has found ways to manipulate the financial markets and create one of the largest economic crises in U.S. history.

The difference between what happened with the ATM heist and what some of the country’s biggest banks have, and continue to do, is that those thieves got caught and will be punished – and the ringleader is dead. But America’s banks continue to manipulate the market and get away with this financial malfeasance because, as we all know, they are considered too big to fail
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Presidential Debates Let Wall Street Off the Hook

Friday, October 26th, 2012

Roy Oppenheim’s commentary was originally published on Yahoo! Homes and is being republished on South Florida Law Blog with their permission.

So we’ve managed to get through all three presidential debates.

But although the presidential election is (thankfully) in the home stretch, did we really learn anything new about either President Barack Obama or Gov. Mitt Romney?

And more importantly, what everyone should be asking is why neither candidate refused to acknowledge the 900-pound gorillas in the room. They were there, but they got a cursory glance at best. These issues are glaring and obvious, yet it is as if they did not exist. It is the reason why many voters are still scratching their heads and asking the following questions.

Why isn’t housing the No. 1 domestic economic issue in this campaign?

Both the president and Romney spent exceedingly too much time on the national debt, when our economy starts and ends with housing. For the first time since the Great Depression, the real estate market has not pulled the economy out of recession. Structurally that is huge, because it was in fact the real estate market that caused the recession in the first place.

But more importantly, the recession was caused by greed and a confluence of people falling asleep at the switch. You have the government that has not properly regulated the banks, who have used their cozy relationship with the regulators to grow larger and more powerful as our nation’s leaders stood idly by.

And now you are left with entire industries, including Wall Street, effectively overshadowing the role of government. At times it seems like moral character has been checked at the foot of Wall Street.
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Dallas Fed Calls Out Too Big To Fail Banks

Thursday, March 29th, 2012

Too Big To Fail used to be a joke.

It became an insult hurled by Occupy Wall Street or the Tea Party at the big banks, but that’s all it was.

It was never an expression that had any legitimacy. It was just a nice little way for the media to classify the banking industry in a ready-made slogan.

Guess what? Too Big To Fail isn’t a joke anymore. It’s actual policy towards our nation’s biggest financial institutions.

The Federal Reserve of Dallas has now legitimized my scathing criticisms of the banks in their annual report and it has resonated with with everything I’ve been writing in this blog.

It was a nice early birthday present when I got home yesterday and read the report, written by the head of the Dallas Fed’s research department. Harvey Rosenblum.

When Greg Smith published his critique of Goldman Sachs, the aftershocks rang through the halls of every office on Wall Street.

After reading Rosenblum’s report, which was subtitled “Why We Must End Too Big To Fail — Now”, I can only imagine what will happen now.

It’s about time that someone on the government side validated the anger and anxiety shared by the Occupy and Tea Party movements. Right there in an official Fed paper!!

So what did I find so appealing about his critique? He spells it out, clear as day, what Too Big To Fail really is, and what’s it’s led to.

What It Is: In 1970 the top 5 banks possessed 17% of the nation’s banking assets. In 2010? 52 percent.
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Did Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac Just Admit Principal Reduction is Good?

Monday, March 26th, 2012

Could Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac finally be willing to sign off on principal reduction as a way to keep homeowners out of foreclosure and in their homes?

Edward DeMarco, the acting head of the Federal Housing Finance Agency and de facto leader of the two GSEs has been steadfast in his opposition.

President Obama has made principal reduction priority one. It was one of the highlights of the mortgage settlement and many economists point to it as the way out of this housing mess.

But DeMarco still hasn’t budged, because he says principal reduction will cost the taxpayer money and isn’t good for Fannie and Freddie’s bottom line.

Except maybe it is.

According to NPR and ProPublica, executives at both Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac have concluded that principal reduction would prevent larger losses and in fact, save the two companies money.

Their report claims that in part because of new Obama incentives, which would reimburse lenders half of what they write off, that Fannie and Freddie would benefit from principal reduction

These presentations have yet to be made public, but Democrats are already clamoring to see them. And so am I.

Look I’m not saying that principal reduction comes without risk. Could everyone decide to stop paying their mortgages in order to get a write-down? Sure.

But just because you might get hit by a car doesn’t mean you don’t cross the street. The housing market will NEVER rebound if people keep getting kicked to the curb.

And I don’t care what Edward DeMarco has said, the bottom line shouldn’t be his bottom line. It shouldn’t be about what is cost effective, it should be about what keeps borrowers in their homes. Last time I checked, they are taxpayers too.
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