Compliance & Regulation

The New York banking department has reached an agreement with Morgan Stanley to implement new mortgage servicing standards after signing a similar deal with Goldman Sachs in September.

A new Senate bill proposing to wind down the GSEs by at least 10% a year also includes a provision that would replace the private MERS System with an identical platform run by the Federal Housing Finance Agency -- along with new national standards for mortgage title transfers.

Regulators have identified how borrowers may have been harmed by a multitude of foreclosure errors, but they are largely leaving it to the servicers and their consultants to figure out how to fix it.

A bipartisan group of senators, including Bob Corker (R-Tenn.), Mike Crapo (R-Idaho), Kay Hagan (D-N.C.), and Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.), Wednesday sponsored new legislation that would set up a covered bond framework in the U.S.

For more than a year, Republicans have been hammering Democrats for what they say are the hefty economic costs of new financial regulations.

Sen. Bob Corker, R-Tenn., Wednesday introduced legislation that would reduce Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac's share of the mortgage market by "at least 10%" per year.

The House Financial Services Committee is slated to vote next Tuesday (Nov. 15) on a bill that would suspend the compensation packages of top Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac executives.

The Federal Housing Administration and Internal Revenue Service will begin allowing electronic signatures on FHA loan documents and the 4506-T form in 2012, according to the Mortgage Bankers Association.

County and state officials are turning up the heat on MERS, as recent lawsuits filed in Florida, Delaware and Texas challenge the validity and accuracy of the mortgage industry-controlled loan registry.

A judge has given the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. and former executives at Washington Mutual Bank until yearend to settle civil charges related to the thrift's 2008 failure, raising the likelihood of an out-of-court resolution.