January 24, 2008

Deutsche Bank Trust Company, Goldman Sachs Group, and Bank of America Corporation are Among the 21 Lenders Named in Cleveland, Ohio Lawsuit

The city of Cleveland, Ohio is suing 21 financial institutions for hundreds of millions of dollars in damages caused by subprime lending and securitization. The defendants named in the lawsuit are:

• Deutsche Bank Trust Company
• Ameriquest Mortgage Company
• Bank of America Corporation
• The Bear Stearns Companies
• Citigroup, Inc.
• Countrywide Financial Corp.
• Credit Suisse (USA)
• Fremont General Corporation
• GMAC-RFC
• Goldman Sachs Group
• Greenwich Capital Markets, Inc.
• HSBC Holdings, PLC
• Indymac Bancorp., Inc.
• J.P. Morgan Chase Co.
• Lehman Brothers Holdings, Inc.
• Merrill Lynch & Co., Inc.
• Morgan Stanley
• Novastar Financial Inc.
• Option One Mortgage Corporation
• Washington Mutual Inc.
• Wells Fargo & Co.

The city of Cleveland says that the defendants issued loans to people who would never have been able to pay them back and that the foreclosures were inevitable. The lawsuit says that not only did the financial institutions issue loans to ill-qualified borrowers, but they securitized the loans and used the profits to fund more subprime mortgages, make more money, and secure more borrowers.

In the past two years, Cleveland has experienced over 7,000 foreclosures. Entire city blocks have been vacated and violent crime and arson incidents have increased. 1,000 abandoned homes have been torn down. Cleveland is calling the “propagation of subprime mortgages… and the corresponding foreclosures... a public nuisance as defined by Ohio common law.

As a result, the city of Cleveland’s population was 444,000 last year—way down from its nearly one million residents in 1950. The decrease in population size has negatively affected the city’s budget.

The stockbroker law firm of Shepherd Smith and Edwards represents investors who have lost money due to the misconduct or negligent actions of broker-dealers and other financial institutions. Contact Shepherd Smith and Edwards today and one of our stockbroker fraud lawyers will be happy to offer you a free consultation.

Related Web Resources:

Cleveland Sues 21 Lenders Over Subprime Mortgages, Herald-Tribune, January 12, 2008

Read the Complaint (PDF)

December 12, 2007

Bear Stearns, Deutsche Bank, and Merrill Lynch Among the Wall Street Firms Subpoenaed by New York Prosecutors

New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo is subpoenaing several Wall Street firms, including Deutsche Bank AG, Merrill Lynch & Co, and Bear Stearns, for information about packaging and selling debt connect to high-risk mortgages.

Prosecutors want to look at the way investment banks review the quality of mortgages before turning them into packaged products that can be sold to investors. They also want to find out how debt is being turned into securities and learn more about the credit-rating firm-bank relationship.

This past summer, mortgage-backed securities affected by growing default and delinquency rates had high debt ratings despite the backing of loans issued to lenders.

Two hedge funds run by Bear Stearns fell apart—instigating the credit markets crisis. The collapse cost investors some $1.6 billion. The collapse cost Merrill Lynch, a big investor in the fund and other subprime mortgage securities close, to $8 billion.

The investigation will look at the way relationships among third-party due-diligence firms, mortgage companies, credit-rating firms, and securities firms and their connection to the firms’ involvement with the subprime mortgage crisis. Underwriting standards will also be reviewed.

Last month, NY Attorney General Cuomo sent subpoenas to investment banks as part of his investigation into U.S. mortgage loans. Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac were among those subpoenaed.

If you are an investor who has lost money because of the misconduct of anyone in the securities industry, contact Shepherd Smith and Edwards right away. One of our securities fraud attorneys would be happy to speak with you during a free consultation. Shepherd Smith and Edwards has helped thousands of investors recover their losses.


Related Web Resources:

Wall St. firms get subprime subpoenas, CNN.com, December 5, 2007

New York State Attorney General Andrew Cuomo

Merrill Lynch

Bear Stearns

Deutsche Bank

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October 9, 2007

Citigroup, Lehman Brothers, DeutscheBank and other Firms Fined for Failing to Deliver Trade Confirmations.

NYSE Regulation fined 14 of its member firms a total of $10.4 million in fines for failing to deliver trade confirmations to their clients and other violations.

Citigroup Global Markets received the heaviest fine of $2.25 million for failing to deliver trade confirmation documents in more than a million consumer transactions. Lehman Brothers and DeutscheBank were each fined $1.25 million.

Other firms sanctioned included UBS Securities; Bear Stearns & Co.; Credit Suisse Securities (USA) LLC ; Banc of America Securities LLC; Goldman Sachs & Co.; JP Morgan Securities; Wachovia Capital Markets LLC; and Keefe, Bruyette & Woods Inc. Fines levied against these firms ranged from $375,000 to $800,000.

According to the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) enforcement wing, the violations occurred between July 1, 2003 and Oct 31, 2004. These include failures to ensure delivery of prospectuses to customers who purchased securities and mutual funds, failure to deliver product descriptions to customers purchasing exchange traded funds and failure to establish and maintain appropriate supervisory procedures regarding such activities.

Each of the member firms also agreed to certify that its current policies and procedures are reasonably designed to ensure compliance with current federal securities laws and regulations regarding such requirements. This action was one of the final acts by the regulatory staff of the NYSE prior joining the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA) which has taken over all former NASD and NYSE regulatory responsibilities.

Shepherd Smith and Edwards represents investors nationwide in claims against securities firms. We have represented investors in more than 1,000 securities cases. To learn whether we may be able to assist you with a claim contact us to arrange a free consultation with one of our attorneys.


June 21, 2007

Merrill Lynch Seizes $400 Million of Assets from a Bear Stearns Managed 'Subprime' Hedge Fund for Failing to Meet Margin Calls

A hedge fund managed by Bear Stearns that takes both bullish and bearish positions in subprime loans has been hit heavily by conditions in that market. Some of the fund's assets were held at Merrill Lynch, on margin. When the equity in the fund dropped, Merrill issued margin calls.

The hedge fund reportedly began with about $600 million in investor capital, $40 million of that from Bear Stearns and its executives, then borrowed $6 billion from Wall Street lenders, including Merrill, Goldman Sachs, Bank of America and Deutsche Bank.

As the fund's assets lost market value, the Bear Stearns managers scrambled to sell hundreds of millions of dollars in assets to satisfy demands for cash and assets from creditors to stave off liquidation of the fund. The managers auctioned almost $4 billion in mortgage bonds, and attempted to present a 30-day plan to sell more assets, but was unable to persuade Merrill to refrain from seizing assets.

An auction was then held by Merrill to liquidate these assets and the fund's fate remains in peril. It the hedge fund is dissolved it would become the second blowup of hedge funds dealing in the high risk home loans, known as "subprime" mortgages. UBS AG shut down Dillon Read Capital Management after bad trades in subprime-mortgage loans led to a $124 million loss.

Wall Street is concerned that the asset liquidations could cause values on other subprime pools to spiral downward causing additional pressure to liquidate other simliar portfolios. Sub-prime mortgages react to market conditions different than high-quality and liquid mortgage-backed bonds, and are more akin to "junk" corporate bonds in fluctuation and liquidity.

Shepherd Smith and Edwards is a securities law firm which represents investors nationwide in claims against investment firms. To learn whether our firm can assist you or your firm, contact us to arrange a free confidential consultation with one of our attorneys.

May 7, 2007

A Warning on Risk in Securities backed by Commercial Mortgages

In the wake of the collapse of the subprime residential mortgage market, the leading bond rating agencies are beginning to crack down on what they see as risky lending practices in commercial real estate as well.

Like residential loans, commercial mortgages are pooled and packaged into bonds that are sliced up into portions carrying different degrees of risk. According to Moody’s, there were $769.6 billion in commercial mortgage-backed securities at the end of last year, representing 26.1 percent of all outstanding commercial mortgages, including apartment buildings.

The agencies that rate these securities have issued warnings in the past, but last month they sounded a new note of urgency, saying that for the first time they would adjust their ratings to reflect their concerns.

“Underwriting has gotten so frothy that we have to take a stand,” said Jim Duca, a group managing director at Moody’s Investors Service. “The industry was heading to Niagara Falls.”

Standard & Poor’s said that in the first quarter of this year, the delinquency rate for such bonds reached its highest level since its delinquency index was created in 1999.

Fitch also predicted a 15 percent increase in defaults of loans being currently written and bond analysts agree that a large number of the loans issued recently could result in large problems down the road.

As was the case in the overheated residential mortgage market, many loans for commercial transactions were designed to be borrower-friendly, including interest-only payments for the first 10 years with balloon payments at the end of the term. The agencies point out that, unlike the vast majority of residential loans, commercial lenders are not requiring landlords to set aside adequate reserves to cover taxes, insurance and other costs. Many lenders are prone to accept overly optimistic projections by borrowers, including occupancy and rental rate growth.

While the agencies are just starting to reflect their new credit-tightening standards, their warnings are already having repercussions in the bond market. Investors are demanding higher rates of return, making the bonds costlier for the dealers, said Rob Brennan, the global head of real estate financing for Credit Suisse. “The fact is that the marketplace forces the change immediately,” he said.

Many investors who own these commercial mortgages and mortgage backed securities have experienced default losses. As recent credit rating warnings have caused interest rates to rise on newer loans this has also caused the value of loans and securities held by these investors to fall in value, in some cases precipitously.
Last month, a new $4.2 billion commercial-mortgage-backed security offered by GE Capital had to be restructured after investors complained. Five loans totaling $226.7 million were removed from the offering, and the investment-grade portion of another loan was further trimmed by $50 million. Most of the loans removed from the offering were originated by Deutsche Bank, which also provided $6 billion in debt financing for the purchase nearly all the Manhattan portions of a portfolio. Deutsche Bank declined a request for comment on the restructuring of the GE Capital bond.

Brenan, a securitization industry veteran, said the changes were necessary even though they would result in higher costs to the investment banks. “We’re trading some short-term pain for long-term gain,” he said. “If we do this right, we’ll stop a level of excess from getting out of hand. We want to avoid the kind of train wreck that the subprime market experienced.”


At Shepherd, Smith, and Edwards our attorneys and staff have more than 100 years of collective past experience in securities regulation and the securities industry. We represent institutional and individual clients who have sustained significant losses in their investments. Phone toll free at (800) 259-9010 or contact us online at Shepherd, Smith, and Edwards to schedule a free consultation with one of our attorneys.