Elizabeth Warren calls SEC’s settlement with hedge fund manager Steve Cohen a joke

Sen. Elizabeth Warren reignited her feud with Securities and Exchange Commission chair Mary Jo White — and this time she’s dragging billionaire hedgie Steven Cohen into the middle of it.

Warren (D-Ma.) on Thursday ripped into the SEC for allowing the former SAC Capital chieftain to start a new hedge fund firm just two months after he was barred from managing outside money until 2018.

Cohen’s move has made a “mockery of the SEC’s core mission to protect investors,” Warren wrote in an open letter to White.

In January, Cohen agreed to a two-year ban on managing outside money to resolve allegations of insider trading at his former firm. He didn’t admit to any wrongdoing as part of his agreement with the SEC.

SAC Capital had already paid $1.8 billion to settle civil and criminal charges tied to the long-running investigation. After the plea deal, Cohen converted SAC into an $11 billion “family office,” Point 72, which mostly manages his huge personal fortune.

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Three major nonbank mortgage servicers; Only one is profitable

The common view that nonbanks are taking over the mortgage space from the big banks in a meaningful way is being muted by a harsh-reality report from Moody’s Investors Service.

While nonbanks continue to make decent inroads on the originations side of the business, it’s the servicing side that’s proved more of a struggle.

According to a Moody’s review of 2015 financials at the three largest US non-bank mortgage servicers — Nationstar Mortgage, Ocwen Financial andWalter Investment Management — only one was profitable.

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Department of Justice loses another one of its top cops on mortgage fraud

Less than a month after Stuart Delery, the third in command at the Department of Justice and leader of the DOJ’s investigations into the conduct of banks during the financial crisis, announced he was stepping down, the DOJ is about to lose another of its big guns in the fight against mortgage fraud.

The DOJ announced Wednesday that Benjamin Wagner, who served as the U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of California and spent five years as a co-chair of the Mortgage Fraud Working Group of the President’s Financial Fraud Enforcement Task Force, is resigning at the end of April.

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U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara sent a letter to the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ) finding wrongdoing by U.S. firms and individuals connected to Panama Papers

Letter from the Department of Justice to the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists stating they have opened an investigation. Photograph: US Department of Justice.

 

Judge sets hearing for May 27 in Trump University lawsuit

 

The Washington Post’s bid to unseal documents filed in a class-action case against Trump University will get a hearing in May.

Earlier this month the newspaper asked a San Diego District Court to unseal hundreds of pages of documents in the case against GOP presidential front-runner Donald Trump. The Post argued the lawsuit filed by former Trump University students has become a campaign issue and the documents should thus be available to the public.

 

Former students allege Trump University pitched them expensive real estate coursework, sometimes amounting to tens of thousands of dollars, for real estate seminars where students learned little. Trump has denied the claims and said students overwhelmingly approved of the school.

“This case focuses on allegedly deceptive commercial practices by a leading presidential candidate whose claim to be qualified for the presidency hinges on his business record,” the Washington Post argued in a filing. “Plaintiff’s allegations in this case, and the lawsuit itself, have become prominent campaign issues,” which makes the need for transparency in the case paramount. The hearing on the Post’s request is scheduled for May 27.

Read more: http://www.politico.com/story/2016/04/donald-trump-university-lawsuit-222227#ixzz46RKJtm4q

NY Department of Financial Services probes potential Wall Street link to Panama Papers

New York’s top bank watchdog on Wednesday opened an inquiry into the Panama Papers and any potential connection with some of Wall Street’s heaviest hitters, The Post has learned.

Maria Vullo, the acting superintendent of the state’s Department of Financial Services, sent letters to 13 banks requesting any communications they’ve had with Mossack Fonseca, the Panama law firm which had 40 years of secret documents concerning their work setting up shell companies in tax havens leaked to the media this month, a source familiar with the matter said.

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Break up big banks? Wells Fargo needed size to save Wachovia

Wells Fargo is treading lightly with its regulators these days. For a good reason.

Not only are regulators forcing it to raise more capital, but the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. and the Federal Reserve recently told the San Francisco banking giant that its plan to enter bankruptcy if needed was “not credible.” And this from the very institutions that practically begged Wells to absorb Wachovia during the height of the financial crisis eight years ago.

But instead of complaining loudly, Wells Fargo has adopted a more muted response to the feds. “We understand the importance of these findings and we will address them as we update our plan by the October 1, 2016 deadline identified by the agencies,” the company said. “We remain dedicated to sound resolution planning and preparedness.”

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“This Is Going To Be A National Crisis” – One Of The Largest U.S. Pension Funds Set To Cut Retiree Benefits

A dark storm is brewing in the world of private pensions, and all hell could break loose when it finally hits.

As the Washington Post reports, the Central States Pension Fund, which handles retirement benefits for current and former Teamster union truck drivers across various states including Texas, Michigan, Wisconsin, Missouri, New York, and Minnesota, and is one of the largest pension funds in the nation, has filed an application to cut participant benefits, which would be effective July 1 2016, as it “projects” it will become officially insolvent by 2025. In 2015, the fund returned -0.81%, underperforming the 0.37% return of its benchmark.

Over a quarter of a million people depend on their pension being handled by the CSPF; for most it is their only source of fixed income.

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The Smoking Gun: “Document 17” Links Saudi Embassy In Washington To Sept 11

Zerohedge:

As The Times writes today, new evidence has come to light of a definitive link between Saudi Arabian officials and the 9/11 terrorist attacks “further raising tensions as President Obama travels to the kingdom.”

According to the report, Ghassan Al-Sharbi, a Saudi who became an al-Qa’ida bomb maker, is believed to have taken flying lessons with some of the 9/11 hijackers in Arizona but did not take part in the attacks on New York and the Pentagon that killed 3,000 people in 2001.

He was captured in Pakistan in 2002 and has since been held at Guantanamo Bay. According to a US memo, known as document 17, written in 2003 and quietly declassified last year, the FBI learnt that he had buried a cache of papers shortly before he was captured.

Think of “Document 17” as a mini version of the “28 pages” whose content has yet to be revealed. The document was written by two US investigators examining the possible roles of foreign governments in the attacks.

One detail leapt out at the FBI agents from the papers that Sharbi had tried to hide: his US flight certificate was in an envelope from the Saudi embassy in Washington.

Audits of leading life insurance companies have uncovered a systematic, industry-wide practice of not paying significant numbers of beneficiaries

I saw this on 60 Minutes last weekend. Wow, unbelievable…

Click on the video. Click here.

When you take out a life insurance policy, you pay premiums in the expectation that when you die your spouse or your children will receive the benefit. But audits of the nation’s leading insurance companies have uncovered a systematic, industry-wide practice of not paying significant numbers of beneficiaries. In a little-known series of settlements, 25 of the nation’s biggest life insurance companies have agreed to pay more than $7.5 billion in back-death benefits. However, about 35 insurance companies have not settled and remain under investigation for not paying when the beneficiary is unaware there was a policy, something that is not at all uncommon. Kevin McCarty: The beneficiary never comes forward because he or she doesn’t know the policy exists. But the companies know, says Kevin McCarty, the insurance commissioner of Florida, who led the national task force investigating the industry. And the companies don’t pay, he says, unless a beneficiary makes a claim. [60 MINUTES]