Tuesday, April 28, 2009

The Debts of the Spenders: Mortgage Modification Meets Bond Vigilantes

Translation: The govt WANTS banks to make liar loans . . . . again. But this time they are actively encouraging poor valuations w/actual subsidies.

Hey - it's all about improving the cash flow fundamentals of the real estate mbs (mortgage backed securities). Will these lower modificatione be enough to halt the tide of Alt-A and option ARM re-sets? Or higher rates of unemployment? Somehow, I still have my doubts.

PS: This news could also have sparked today's bond sell off. The govt destroying its credit rating is never good.

WASHINGTON (Dow Jones)--The Obama administration unveiled a fresh set of incentives Tuesday for mortgage servicers to help strapped U.S. homeowners.
Under a new program, the government will pay mortgage servicers $500 up front and $250 a year for three years for successfully modifying a second mortgage, such as a home equity loan.

Second mortgages have complicated government efforts to help borrowers avoid foreclosure. According to the U.S. Treasury Department, up to 50% of at-risk mortgages have second liens and many properties in foreclosure have more than one lien.

Senior administration officials Tuesday told reporters they expect a significant amount of big banks to sign up for the updated federal program to bring relief to troubled homeowners. Once those firms sign necessary contracts, they'll generally be obligated to modify second liens when they've initiated a modification on the first, the officials said. They also noted that the second lien program will be funded by the $50 billion in Troubled Asset Relief Program, or TARP, funds the administration had already projected to use for home affordability efforts.

3 comments:

the darkcloud said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
the darkcloud said...

IDWT -

Spotted your blog through Zero Hedge. Nice work.

For a fascinating take on CDS/derivatives (an earlier post of yours) I highly recommend the following post below.

The Conclusions piece of the post discussess a fascinating concept - "Derivatives: The New Private Currency" - totally blowing me away. As much as I have been trying to make sense of our nonsensical situation, some of the thoughts in here are very provocative: how derivatives have become financial banks own "private" currency and so much bigger a currency than central banks and governments combined, shadow hyperinflation (possibly here or very near), etc.

here's the link:

http://www.mi2g.com/cgi/mi2g/press/151108.php

If the above link does not work, you can also access it through my blog at:

http://darkcloudstlmo.blogspot.com/2009/04/derivatives-21st-century-currency-and.html

Bottom line: The central banks and governments are owned by the financials and others who are in derivatives.

Makes sense to me.

Best regards.

In Debt We Trust said...

Good stuff people - thanks for posting.

Blog Archive