Bank Of America | featured news

Bank of America is testing a mortgage-to-lease program in four states. The idea: Instead of evicting homeowners who face foreclosure, it lets them stay as tenants and sells the homes to investors.

Bank of America is making its first moves as part of its deal with the government in the massive $25 billion mortgage settlement. The nation’s second largest bank said today that it started reaching out to more than 200,000 customers about principal reductions on their mortgages. The letters from the bank are expected to arrive at customers’ homes this week with much of the remaining to be sent out by July.

Bank of America Corp. is launching a pilot program that will allow homeowners at risk of foreclosure to hand over deeds to their houses and sign leases that will let them rent the houses back from the bank at a market rate.

The Federal Reserve also said on Tuesday that JPMorgan Chase, Wells Fargo, U.S. Bancorp and others could raise dividends or buy back stock.

Bank of America said Friday it would reduce by about $100,000 the amount owed by as many as 200,000 underwater homeowners as part of the recently announced government foreclosure settlement with top mortgage servicers.

Bank of America NA prevented homeowners from receiving mortgage-loan modifications under a federal program in order to avoid millions of dollars in losses while benefitting from financial incentives for participating in the program, according to a complaint unsealed in federal court Wednesday.

Bank of America made $2 billion in the last three months of last year, reversing a loss from a year earlier. It offset legal expenses over mortgages and losses in its investment...

The Justice Department is expected to announce Wednesday a settlement with Bank of America Corp. that resolves accusations that its Countrywide Financial unit engaged in discriminatory mortgage-lending practices, according to a person familiar with the matter.

The ratings firm Fitch downgraded a cluster of the world's largest banks Thursday, pointing to trading challenges facing international markets. The banks included Bank of America, Morgan Stanley and Goldman Sachs, as well as Europe's Barclays, Societe Generale and BNP Paribas. Germany's Deutsche Bank and Switerzland's Credit Suisse were also downgraded.

Bank of America Corp employees are flooding rival companies with resumes as a major cost-cutting program gets under way at the second-largest U.S. bank.