The largest settlement to come out of the housing crisis was announced today wherein the Department of Justice is mandating that Bank of America cough up $17,000,000,000 (that’s billion) for selling bad mortgages. Citi’s $13B and Chase’s $9B pale by comparison. If you’ll remember, BofA was strong-armed into acquiring Countrywide’s portfolio about five years ago. That’s where the bulk of the “toxic” loans were sourced. But that’s now old news and we move on to a Ukraine jet being shot down and Russia banning food imports from the U.S. The dawn of a new cold war on the horizon just begs the question: “where is Tom Cruise when you need him?”
