Part I of this series, Part II, Part III, Part IV, Part V, Part VI. Shirley Snider lives in Vashon Island, Washington, and has a mortgage with Citi. Her story is a textbook example of how banks and servicers have used the HAMP modification program to lock borrowers into worse terms than the program mandates. [...]

One of the question I tried to ask several of the politicians at Netroots Nation was about this oft-remarked statement about small businesses not being able to secure lending. I’ve seen it expressed on both sides: one, that small community banks have tighter leverage requirements and have consequently tightened their lending standards, making it difficult [...]

Last night, Maria Cantwell announced her support of the Dodd Frank financial reform bill, citing a letter from Commodity Futures Trading Commission chief Gary Gensler ensuring her that the derivatives title will be rigorously enforced. In the letter, Gensler says that the legislation, in his view, mandates clearing and exchange trading for “standardized over-the-counter derivatives” [...]

At this hour, the Wall Street reform conference committee is convening to deal with the remaining issues in the bill, which was thrown into disarray when resistance from Scott Brown and others to a $19 billion dollar bank tax threatened final passage. Reportedly, conferees will deal with that mainly by closing the TARP early: Democrats [...]

Democrats will return to the conference committee on the Dodd-Frank Wall Street reform bill as soon as today, specifically to deal with the $19 billion dollar bank tax that has moderate Republicans needed for Senate passage flipping their votes. The unusual development points to deepening troubles for Democrats in their push to finish the bill [...]

Before today, Scott Brown was expressing “concern” about the $19 billion bank tax inserted into the Dodd-Frank conference report to satisfy paygo rules. Today he actually said he couldn’t support the bill. U.S. Senator Scott Brown, a Republican who previously backed the regulatory-overhaul bill, withdrew his support, citing a $19 billion fee on banks and [...]

If this isn’t a Lucy-with-the-football moment, I don’t know what is. Brian Beutler reports that Hill aides told him President Obama’s Treasury Department sided with Scott Brown in the waning moments of the Wall Street reform conference committee, favoring his loophole for the Volcker rule designed to help asset management companies in Massachusetts. In the [...]

We have a wealth of experts weighing in on the Dodd-Frank financial reform bill (the text of which is available here). Edmund Andrews, Andrew Leonard, Damian Paletta, Rep. Alan Grayson and especially this collection of luminaries courtesy of the Roosevelt Institute (Rob Johnson, Elizabeth Warren, Marshall Auerback, etc.) are worth reading. But all the debating [...]

Ryan Grim had the story last night: Larry Summers and his deputy, Diana Farrell, along with Eric Stein, Treasury’s guy for consumer affairs, met with progressive groups at the Eisenhower building to talk Wall Street reform. There were few surprises, meeting attendees tell HuffPost Hill, with Summers and the groups mostly in accord. The one [...]

I’ve written plenty about the potential derivatives loophole in the Senate Wall Street reform bill, which Maria Cantwell felt concerned enough about that she tried to block a cloture vote on the entire legislation (although she did give consent to waiving the Budget Act at the last minute, which also could have held up the [...]

So I leave for just a couple of hours, and the story I’ve been following for weeks comes to a resolution. Sheesh… OK, so here’s what happened, as best as I can tell. Last I left things, cloture had passed on the Wall Street reform bill, but there were two outstanding post-cloture amendments. One concerned [...]