(Reuters) – JPMorgan Chase & Co, (JPM.N) the second-largest U.S. mortgage lender, is backing away from making home loans to less creditworthy borrowers after losing faith in its ability to recover much money from foreclosing on homes, even with government guarantees.

The shift reflects a change in the way the bank views its mortgage business: where before it viewed collateral and U.S. government lending programs as key backstops to most loans it was making, now it is determined to never have to foreclose.

To avoid loans that default, it is doing more work on establishing the capacity and willingness of borrowers to pay their loans. The bank is losing market share in government-backed loans, but is doing so consciously, JPMorgan executives told analysts Tuesday on a conference call.

“We maintained discipline regarding pricing to our required returns,” Chief Financial Officer Marianne Lake said.

Lenders have broadly been paying…

The Homeowners Loan Act of 1933 need to be revised and updated today. The loan act in 1933 was  to refinance home mortgages that were in default or at risk of foreclosure due to the 1929 crash and the collapse of the housing industry. Sounds familiar to what happen in 2008? By the way, by 1934, about one in five mortgages in America were owned by the corporation. And how many loans today are owned by the government? About 60%. About 20% of the loans in this country are owned by the banks.

It’s time to start helping the people, and stop helping Wall Street.

According to an agreement announced earlier today, big bank Citigroup will pay $7 billion to settle a Department of Justice investigation into that bank’s involvement with risky subprime mortgages.

The agreement stems from Citigroup’s role in the trading of subprime mortgage securities, which helped to cause the…

A couple days late with this update, but it’s such great news, I gotta share anyway!

If you read the story “All Hands On Deck: Fighter Served Eviction Papers” from Tuesday, you know that Michigan homeowner KathyJo Torrenga faced eviction from her family home by the “foreclosure Death Star” of Republican Congressional candidate Dave Trott.

In true David and Goliath fashion however, Torrenga got a cease and desist order against the would-be eviction, proving the obvious–you can’t win if you don’t fight. Put another way, you will lose if you don’t fight. And of course, resistance is victory.

Torrenga provided some details of what went down in court on Wednesday, July 9 in an email interview…

LRM: The judge granted you a cease and desist against the entity who wanted to evict you, correct?

Torrenga: Yes.

LRM: On what grounds?

Torrenga:I asked for a copy of…

Wow, very sad..

As IB Times reports,

JP Morgan executive director Julian Knott blasted his wife Alita to death with a shotgun before turning the gun on himself. 

The 45-year-old, who worked for the investment bank in London until July 2010, shot his 47-year-old wife multiple times before committing suicide with the same weapon.

The couple met in London, with Alita opening nursery Quayside Tots Playgroup in Southwick, West Sussex, before they moved to the United States.

She remained the playgroup’s care provider until at least February 2013, according to the nursery’s most recent Ofsted report.

Julian moved to the United States from London in 2010 and was working at JP Morgan’s Global Network Operations Center in Whippany, New Jersey, at the time of the tragedy.

Jefferson Township police, in New Jersey, confirmed on Sunday they had found two unconscious bodies at the Knotts’ large suburban home at 1.12am.

A statement released…

BNP Paribas (>> BNP PARIBAS), for the second time in nine days, pleaded guilty on Wednesday to conspiring to violate U.S. sanctions, as part of a nearly $9 billion settlement in which the French bank admitted to breaking embargoes against Sudan, Cuba and Iran.

BNP Paribas (>> BNP PARIBAS), for the second time in nine days, pleaded guilty on Wednesday to conspiring to violate U.S. sanctions, as part of a nearly $9 billion settlement in which the French bank admitted to breaking embargoes against Sudan, Cuba and Iran.

Prosecutors had accused the bank of processing billions of dollars through the U.S. financial system on behalf of the Sudanese and others barred because of human rights abuses, support for terrorists and other national security concerns.

Read on.

Inquirer.com (sub. req.):

Montgomery County could receive nearly $16 million – or more – from a federal ruling against the banking industry’s mortgage registry, and attorneys are now reaching out to other counties nationwide to get in on the action.

U.S. District Judge J. Curtis Joyner in Philadelphia ruled June 30 that Mortgage Electronic Registration Systems and its parent company, Merscorp Inc., collectively known as MERS, violated Pennsylvania law by using its members-only database to circumvent county recorder of deeds offices.

As a result, Joyner ruled, counties lost millions of dollars in fees, the accuracy of public records was compromised, and home loans were sold time and again without the knowledge of homeowners or county recorders.

“Over the past several years, a number of residents who were facing foreclosures didn’t know who owned their mortgage or to whom they should be making their mortgage payments,” Joyner wrote.

If the…