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Do you know Ally Financial Inc.? You've no doubt seen their commercials. They used to be all over the tube hawking their high-yielding certificates of deposit. Now they're all over the tube with their "no hidden fees" campaign. . . . But Ally isn't funny. It recently announced that it's launching an initial public offering (IPO) of its stock at a price per share of $25 to $28. The shares will be offered by the U.S. Treasury as part of its planned exit of its investment in Ally during the subprime crisis in 2008. I've heard some analysts say this...

Amount of taxpayer funding given to GM and GMAC comes to a staggering $50.4 billion.Two weeks ago, General Motors Co. (GM) announced that they were investing $691 million in Mexico, and while they acknowledged the expansion would bring many new jobs south of the border, they would not disclose the actual figure. The Detroit News reported: “The Detroit-based automaker said it will spend $349 million for the new transmission plant in Silao; $131 million to expand its San Luis Potosi Complex transmission plant and to build lighter and smoother transmissions with better fuel economy, and $211 million to expand its...

The Federal Reserve's latest round of stress tests for the banking industry showed only one bank remaining on a shaky financial foundation . That bank was government-owned Ally Financial (the bailed-out company formerly known as GMAC), which also happens to be General Motors' prime source for financing. GM divested itself of GMAC so that the struggling lender could be classified as a bank holding company and receive billions of taxpayer dollars. In a move to distance itself from GM, the company was renamed Ally Financial. The government maintains majority ownership of Ally Financial, which in turn has helped GM by...

The final pieces are coming together in the General Motors' restructuring puzzle as the company has, not surprisingly, won its bid to repurchase government-owned Ally Financial's European and Latin American lending operations. GM was forced to spin off all but 10% of Ally Financial back when it was known as GMAC. Back in late 2008, the spigots of taxpayer money were open and GM had its cup out. In order for GM's lending arm (GMAC) to receive TARP funds, GM had to divest all but less than 10% of the company so that GMAC could be granted status as a...

Ally, which is 74 percent owned by the U.S. government, makes loans to GM and Chrysler customers and finances dealer inventories. The government first bailed out the company, then known as GMAC Inc., in late 2008 as part of the Bush administration's aid to the auto industry. The Obama administration provided additional funding in May and December 2009. ResCap had been a drain on Ally's finances for years, struggling to make payments on its heavy debt ever since the bottom fell out of the U.S. housing market in 2007. In regulatory filings before the bankruptcy, Ally said that deterioration in...

The Obama Administration has become quite the expert on bankruptcy filings. The Detroit Free Press reports that the third auto bailout partaker, Ally Financial, has filed bankruptcy for its mortgage subsidiary, ResCap. The government still owns 74% of Ally, and now has an 0 for 3 record on restructuring bailed out auto-related companies outside of bankruptcy. Three years ago the Obama Administration, particularly the Auto Task Force, had a mission to restructure General Motors, Chrysler and GM's lending arm, GMAC. The stated goal was to restructure the auto industry players outside of bankruptcy. This stated goal turned out to be...

<p>Ally Financial Inc.'s troubled mortgage subsidiary filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy early Monday, potentially paving the way for Ally to sever itself from substantial litigation that has been a drag on its other operations and prevented it from repaying the remainder of its government bailout.</p>

The U.S. Treasury Department has agreed to support a bankruptcy filing for the struggling home-loan unit of government-owned lender Ally Financial Inc., if the company chooses to take that route, an official said Monday. A bankruptcy filing for Ally's subsidiary, Residential Capital, has been widely expected in the coming weeks, when the unit faces more than $300 million of bond-related payments. It recently missed a $20 million bond-interest payment, which has a grace period until May 17. ResCap, once one of the largest subprime-mortgage lenders in the country, has been a drag on Ally, which halted plans for an initial...

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Federal Reserve says four major banks failed to show they have enough capital to survive another serious downturn. The list includes Citigroup, the nation's third-largest bank. The Fed says 15 of 19 major banks passed the stress test. The Fed noted that all of the banks have built up their capital reserves since the 2008 financial crisis. SunTrust and Ally Financial also failed the test.

As reported yesterday, the cost of terminal abrogation of contractual rights in the US is, drumroll, $26 billion. Bloomberg notes: -$26 BILLION FORECLOSURE SETTLEMENT ANNOUNCED IN WASHINGTON -FORECLOSURE ACCORD RESOLVES 16-MONTH ROBO-SIGNING INVESTIGATION -FORECLOSURE ACCORD IS SUBJECT TO APPROVAL BY FEDERAL JUDGE -FORECLOSURE DEAL PRESERVES U.S., STATE RIGHTS TO OTHER CLAIMS -FORECLOSURE ACCORD COULD CLIMB TO $40 BLN IF 14 SERVICERS JOIN And a whole lot of corner offices for America's Attorneys General. As for what the market thinks of this "severe" settlement: BAC +1.2%, WFC +0.6%, JPM +0.4%, C -0.1%. For those who don't understand what just happened, US...

(Reuters) - Ally Financial Inc, the United States' largest maker of car loans, hopes that people have forgotten the time when "subprime" became a synonym for "disaster." Ally, once known as GMAC Financial Services, is getting ready to go public this year, and is making the case that subprime loans for used car buyers are not about to produce the same results that they did in the housing market a few years ago -- a near-collapse of the financial system. Auto loans performed relatively well during the downturn, and demand for cars is up, so auto lending is one of...

Former President Bill Clinton is coming to Chicago in January to campaign for mayoral candidate Rahm Emanuel. Before serving in President Barack Obama's White House and representing the North Side of Chicago in Congress, Emanuel worked in Clinton's administration as a senior adviser for policy and strategy. Clinton is scheduled to headline a public event that highlights Emanuel's role in passing a crime bill....

Plaintiff's Motion for Entry of Protective Order at 7. As grounds for it's motion, Plaintiff points to the embarrassment GMAC and it's employees suffered, and will continue to suffer, from the posting of excerpts from Stephan's deposition transcript on an Internet blog. The Court is not persuaded that the Plaintiff has shown the requisite "good cause" to justify entry of a protective order in this case.

NEW YORK (Dow Jones)--U.S. stocks closed modestly lower Thursday as investors retreated from financials because of concerns over banks' foreclosure practices. The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 1.51 points, or 0.01%, to 11094.6, snapping a four-session winning streak in a day of choppy trading. Financials led the Dow's declines. Bank of America dropped 69 cents, or 5.2%, to 12.60 and J.P. Morgan Chase fell $1.12, or 2.8%, to $38.72. Both are among the wave of banks reviewing their foreclosures after temporarily suspending evictions due to concerns over "robo signers," who approve hundreds of foreclosure documents a day. Among other banks...

The new, 49-state investigation into foreclosure frauds comes as no surprise to people who follow the mortgage service business. Shoddy, deceptive paperwork has plagued homewowners for years. In the industry’s slimy underside, firms push borrowers into default and foreclosure, even when they’ve been making payments on time. Their business model makes defaults profitable, says Marie McConnell who has been auditing mortgages for 24 years. The ugly chain of deception starts with the way the servicers handle your escrow account. A mortgage service company collects your monthly payments, deducts a fee, and passes the remainder to the investors who own the...

Ohio Attorney General Richard Cordray announced a lawsuit Wednesday against GMAC Mortgage LLC and its parent Ally Financial Inc., accusing the loan servicer of filing fraudulent documents "to mislead courts in hundreds of Ohio foreclosures."

Now we got trouble.I am in receipt of a copy of a bulletin from Old Republic Title in which it states: The Company will not insure title to any property which has been foreclosed by Ally Financial, Ally Bank or GMAC until further notice. Oops.I suspect this is going to spread fast, given that this "wee problem" is NOT specific to GMAC and Ally.  In fact, JP Morgan/Chase has reported "similar discrepancies", and then today we had my report on a ruling from a court in which a counterfeit summons was issued not by the court, but by a...

J.P. Morgan Chase, one of the nation's leading banks, announced Wednesday that it will freeze foreclosures in about half the country because of flawed paperwork, a move that Wall Street analysts said will pressure the rest of the industry to follow suit. The bank's decision will affect 56,000 borrowers in 23 states where allegations of forged documents and signatures and other similar problems are being used to try to overturn court-ordered evictions. Yet the impact may be much broader, given J.P. Morgan's stature in the industry. If other banks adopt the same approach, the foreclosure process in many parts of...

Ally Financial has not called off evictions in the other 27 states or the District of Columbia, none of which require a court order to initiate a foreclosure. And yet in those places, distressed borrowers, on the brink of losing their homes, are finding flawed and forged documents in their files and scrambling to challenge foreclosure proceedings. Joan Cavanagh, who lives near Cape Cod, in Massachusetts, a state not included in Ally Financial's moratorium, is scheduled to be kicked out of her home in 30 days. Her documents were signed by Jeffrey Stephan, the Ally document processor who admitted that...

The nation's overburdened foreclosure system is riddled with faked documents, forged signatures and lenders who take shortcuts reviewing borrower's files, according to court documents and interviews with attorneys, housing advocates and company officials. The problems, which are so widespread that some judges approving the foreclosures ignore them, are coming to light after Ally Financial, the country's fourth-biggest mortgage lender, halted home evictions in 23 states this week.