U.S. federal and state authorities are investigating Credit Suisse AG over mortgage-backed securities packaged and sold by the bank, Reuters reported yesterday. The Justice Department and the New York Attorney General are among those probing Credit Suisse's actions. Zurich-based Credit Suisse is the second bank known to be targeted by U.S. authorities probing how banks bundled mortgage loans into securities during the U.S. housing boom. New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman filed a civil fraud case against JPMorgan Chase & Co on Monday over mortgage-backed securities originated and sold by Bear Stearns.
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In related news, New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman is looking into the mortgage securities practices of at least a dozen financial institutions that have agreed to suspend a deadline for him to bring fraud claims, Bloomberg News reported yesterday. Schneiderman, who sued JPMorgan Chase & Co. this week for defrauding mortgage bond investors, has so-called tolling agreements with 12 institutions that preserve claims that could expire during a state investigation. Schneiderman is the co-chairman of a state-federal taskforce that is investigating misconduct in the bundling of mortgage loans into securities in the run-up to the financial crisis. The group includes the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission and the Justice Department, and the JPMorgan case was its first legal action. Read more: http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-10-04/n-y-mortgage-probe-said-to-get…