The dome of the Capitol is reflected in a puddle in Washington February 17, 2012.REUTERS/Kevin Lamarque

Another debt ceiling debacle could sink the economy

Last year's Congressional debt standoff hurt consumer confidence more than the collapse of Lehman Brothers, Betsey Johnson and Justin Wolfers write. This time could be worse.  Read more at Counterparties  

Wealth and Investing Center

Massachusetts subpoenas Bank of America documents

A Bank of America sign is seen outside of a branch in Greenville, South Carolina, January 18, 2012. REUTERS/Chris Keane

A Bank of America sign is seen outside of a branch in Greenville, South Carolina, January 18, 2012.

Credit: Reuters/Chris Keane

Fri Feb 10, 2012 2:50pm EST

(Reuters) - Massachusetts securities regulators said on Friday that they were subpoenaing Bank of America Corp for documents to determine whether the lender had knowingly overvalued assets in some investment products.

Local investors lost about $150 million in investment vehicles structured by the company's affiliate Banc of America Securities LLC, said William Galvin, the state's top securities regulator.

Now his office is asking the Charlotte, North Carolina-based bank to supply documents for its activities involving collateralized loan obligations.

The CLOs include LCM VII Ltd and Bryn Mawr CLO II Ltd, which were structured by the bank and sold to investors in 2007.

Bank of America spokesman Bill Halldin said the bank doesn't comment on regulatory inquiries, except to say that it cooperates fully with them.

Galvin, who has been especially aggressive in looking into how big banks hurt small investors during the housing crisis and financial crisis, said he wanted to find out whether the issuer "was knowingly overvaluing assets in the portfolio to get them off their books and onto investors."

The news comes one day after Bank of America and other large lenders agreed to a $25 billion settlement over alleged foreclosure abuses.

The company's shares were down 1.3 percent at $8.07 in afternoon New York Stock Exchange trading.

(Reporting By Svea Herbst-Bayliss and Rick Rothaker; Editing by Lisa Von Ahn and Gerald E. McCormick)

Related Quotes and News

Company
Price
Related News
We welcome comments that advance the story through relevant opinion, anecdotes, links and data. If you see a comment that you believe is irrelevant or inappropriate, you can flag it to our editors by using the report abuse links. Views expressed in the comments do not represent those of Reuters. For more information on our comment policy, see http://blogs.reuters.com/fulldisclosure/2010/09/27/toward-a-more-thoughtful-conversation-on-stories/
Comments (1)
TRH wrote:
SLCG first uncovered the problem with LCM VII and Bryn Mawr II in December.

For SLCG’s paper on these two CLOs issued last week and some source documents please visit http://www.slcg.com/research.php?c=1b&i=80 for the paper and blog.slcg.com/2012/01/did-boas-2007-clos-defraud-investors.html for our blog entry on the CLOs.

Craig McCann, Olivia Wang and Tim Husson

Feb 10, 2012 3:05pm EST  --  Report as abuse
This discussion is now closed. We welcome comments on our articles for a limited period after their publication.