This is a great article about how our country is becoming bought and paid for.

How many American would rather be couch potatoes and watch reality trash TV than get involved in our political process?

If you don’t use it, you lose it.

http://seekingalpha.com/article/223397-a-closer-look-at-the-banking-industry-s-lobbying-efforts?source=email

Trader Mark:

Long time readers will know that the best return on investment (ROI for you wonky types) in America is lobbying dollars. For a pittance you can purchase present your case to a Congressman or Congresswoman and generate multitudes of that same dollar spent in return.

It appears that Federal Reserve and Treasury officials are also on sale (aisles 7 and 10, respectively). So hurry on in, but only those with annual revenue of $500M+ are allowed in on the bidding! Our financial oligarchs are top dogs at playing the game but it’s across all major industries. Remember, competition in America is good on paper, as long as it does not effect my fortune 500 corporation. Then it must be stymied!

All the usual suspects in the financial oligarchy – no surprise, since they now control the vast majority of American assets. Oops, sorry, let me go by the company line… there are 8,000 financial institutions in Cramerica competing, blah, blah, blah, snore.

Assets:

1. Bank of America (BAC) $2.3 Trillion
2. JPMorgan (JPM) $2.0 Trillion
3. Citigroup (C) $1.8 Trillion
4. Wells Fargo (WFC) $1.3 Trillion

My favorite statistic in this piece was:

• Lobbyist dollars by top 10 Oligarchy (representing perhaps 300K Americans): $16.3M
• Lobbyist dollar by consumer protection groups (representing 300M+ Americans): $0.8M

That’s like bringing a Colt 45 to a gun fight, while the oligarchy has their AK47s in hand. You’ve been served!

Via AP: (My comments in parenthesis)

• The 10 banks that received the most bailout aid during the financial crisis spent over $16 million on lobbying efforts in the first half of 2010, as the debate over financial regulatory reform reached its height.
• Disclosure reports show that the banks that got the most government help in late 2008 and early 2009 also invested the most to influence members of Congress, the White House, the Federal Reserve, Treasury Department and a long list of federal agencies as new rules were enacted governing Wall Street and the nation’s financial system.
• The $16.32 million spent in the first half of 2010 was 26 percent higher than the combined $12.94 million they spent in the first half of 2009.
• “I’m not shocked that they spent that much money because I saw them every day,” said Ed Mierzwinski, consumer program director at U.S. Public Interest Research Group, who said more than 2,000 lobbyists worked on the financial reform bill. (Translation: for one bill there was roughly a 3.5:1 ratio of lobbyist to representative. Think about that. Then multiply that by every industry group – media, telecom, oil, retail, real estate, agriculture, states and cities, et al) “They did manage to make changes.”
• Leading the pack this year was JPMorgan Chase & Co., which spent $1.52 million on lobbying in the second quarter, on top of $1.51 million in the first quarter of 2010, for a total of $3.03 million. [Jul 21, 2009: NYT - In Washinton, JPMorgan's Dimon Increasing Sway] Citigroup Inc., the largest bank recipient of government funds during the crisis in late 2008 and early 2009, was second. The New York-based bank spend $1.47 million on lobbyists in the second quarter, after spending $1.31 million in the first quarter for a total of $2.78 million. And Wall Street titan Goldman Sachs Group Inc. (GS) was third, with $1.58 million spent in the second quarter, on top of $1.19 million in the first quarter of 2010. Bank of America Corp. and Wells Fargo & Co. both also spent more than $2 million in the first half of the year.
• Lobbying figures do not include any campaign contributions that banks or their employees might also have made.
• Consumer advocacy groups had their own lobbyists working the Capitol’s halls during the finance reform debate as well, but their spending was dwarfed by the banks — a total of $792,000 in the first half of the year for four of the top organizations. (Go get em tiger!)
• “We’re talking billions,” Sloan said. “So the lobbying money is the most effective money you’ll spend.” (Translation: once you reach a certain size as a corporation, your actual business becomes a sideshow and your main focus becomes blocking and tackling in Congress to make sure competition is neutered and favoritism in all aspects is bestowed. You could invest $1 in capital or people and potentially lose money, or instead spend $1 in D.C. and make back $50-100 almost guaranteed. There is no better business on the planet.)

The act is meant to enhance consumer protection and reduce mortgage fraud.

The act requires states to license Loan Originators by:

• Passing a written qualified test
• Complete pre-licensure educational courses
• Take annual continuing education courses
• Having LO’s allow their credit to be checked
• Submitting LO fingerprints to the NMLS for criminal background checks via the FBI

The licensing and registration started in 2009.

So how are loan officers doing with the required testing?

NMLS released the following statistics as of June 30, 2010:

What stands out is that 71% of LO’s so far pass the national component part of the test on their first try and 80% pass the state component.  That’s a pretty good number.

On the other hand, only 44% of those that retake the test pass the national component.  That’s horrible! 

What’s this mean? 

Well if you take into account that the test really doesn’t change that much on the subsequent retakes it could mean any of the following:

• those retaking the test do poorly with tests
• they’re not very good at studying
• they have no idea what they’re doing to begin with

It’s estimated that the NMLS requirements have led to over half the LO’s to leave the mortgage business in the past year.

Of course, the economy has played a large role in that also.

MORTGAGE, EXPERT, MICHIGAN, BIRMINGHAM, BLOOMFIELD, DETROIT, ROCHESTER, ROYAL OAK, TROY