Big Banks May Be Forced to Buy Back Bad Mortgage Loans

Major U.S. banks are under pressure from government officials, as well as groups of investors and insurers, to repurchase or modify bad mortgage loans they pooled into securities and sold to unwitting buyers. In the latest effort, a group of investors with roughly $500 billion invested in 2,300 mortgage securities is trying to force the large banks that originated or are now servicing faulty subprime-mortgage loans to repurchase or modify them, The Wall Street Journal reported. Some investors " had no idea that their money was being invested in mortgage-backed securities ," Dallas-based attorney Talcott Franklin told The Journal. "And yet somehow these people are now the ones being punished, and that's just not right."