MORTGAGE SECURITIES

摘要

In a portion of a multidistrict federal civil suit that was brought in the aftermath of the mortgage-backed securities scandal that led to the financial collapse of 2008, the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California overruled a motion to dismiss the claims filed by the Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA) as untimely in that it was filed outside the relevant statute of repose under the Housing and Economic Recovery Act of 2008 (HERA). The motion was filed by the various defendants collectively termed "Countrywide" herein. In re Countrywide Financial Corp. Mortgage-Backed Securities Litigation, 2012 WL 5275327 (C.D. Cal. 2012). The Federal National Mortgage Association (Fannie Mae) and the Federal Home Loan Mortgage Corporation (Freddie Mac), government-sponsored private corporations, were placed in conservatorship under the provisions of HERA, 12 U.S.C.A. para 4617(a)(1), with FHFA statutorily appointed as the conservator, effective on September 6, 2008. Thus all legal rights of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac passed to FHFA as of that date. The suit against Countrywide and other issuers of mortgage-backed securities was filed the FHFA in New York state court on September 2, 2011, was subsequently removed to the federal district court in New York on September 30, 2011, and the portion concerning Countrywide was transferred in February 2012 to the Central District of California.