Enforcement

The monitor of the Bank of America Mortgage Settlement distributed roughly $89 million Tuesday to legal assistance groups in nine states from a fund for federal tax assistance.

The Department of Housing and Urban Development said Friday that an agreement was reached between Fidelity Bank and the Fair Housing Project of North Carolina Legal Aid.

Two St. Louis-area investors have been indicted on charges they defrauded the failed Excel Bank on real estate loans.

Freedom Mortgage has agreed to pay $113 million to settle government allegations that it failed to comply with Federal Housing Administration requirements for originating and servicing FHA-insured loans.

Quicken Loans plans to appeal a recent federal labor ruling that the Detroit lender and other companies owned by Dan Gilbert violated employees' rights.

Goldman Sachs Group will pay $5.1 billion to settle a U.S. probe into its handling of mortgage-backed securities involving allegations that loans weren't properly vetted before being sold to investors as high-quality bonds.

The co-owner of a mortgage company responsible for a large-scale fraud scheme was sentenced to 21 months in prison in a Newark, N.J., federal court.

The housing market has been improving but mortgage credit remains "stubbornly" tight on loans bought by the government-sponsored enterprises, according to a chief housing adviser at the White House.

Nomura Holdings Inc. held a training session after a former Jefferies & Co. managing director was indicted for fraud and encouraged its traders not to lie — but that didn't stop the fibbing to customers about bond prices, according to U.S. prosecutors.

No-action letters from the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau can be an essential tool for lenders in striving to the mortgage process more consumer-friendly through inventive products and service — but lenders must seek them out.