Occupy Wall Street
Who says White Color crime does not pay? Well, once again the bankers on Wall Street get a slap on the wrist after moving more than 45 deals that they knew did not pass their own due diligence measures. Citibank officers knew that the underlying mortgages packaged into these deals were riskier than they were advertising.
This is an on-going pattern of prosecution by US Justice Department which fined JP Morgan Chase the bbiggest U.S. bank, agreed in November of 2013 to pay $13 billion to resolve similar federal and state probes. The government has sought about $17 billion from Bank of America, a person familiar with those talks has said.
So, again we see the Wall Street and the bankers influence even on Justice Department where these settlements are simply a mere negotiations to make sure the fine can be easily absorbed by the banks’ investors without anyone in charge seeing a day in jail.
What’s alarming is the deterrent factor in these fines since none of these bank executives are going to jail or being barred from Wall Street deals or losing their jobs for that matter.
Ironically, the trend to short change the 99% seems to continue even when it comes to these settlements. Only 2.5 Bilion dollars of the Citigroup settlemtn will go to help home owners who were dooped into toxic mortgages. And the sad part is that majority of these home owners have lost their homes and have moved on. Will Citigroup spends much effort to find them as they did to foreclose them?
We doubt it.