Courtesy of Pam Martens.
The SEC Is Indeed Occupied; By Wall Street Lawyers
Yesterday, Mary Jo White, the new Chair of the Securities and Exchange Commission, announced that a law partner from the firm she just left, Debevoise & Plimpton LLP, would become the new Co-Director of the SEC’s Division of Enforcement – the unit that decides who gets prosecuted and who gets a pass.
In making the announcement that Andrew Ceresney of Debevoise & Plimpton will share the post with the Acting Director, George Canellos, White called Ceresney a “former prosecutor.” That hardly does justice to the cozy ties between Ceresney and Wall Street. (Ceresney worked for the U.S. Attorney’s office in the Southern District of New York in a prior career but has been employed at Debevoise since 2003.)
This time last year, Ceresney was basking in the glow of a herculean accomplishment for JPMorgan Chase, Citigroup, Wells Fargo, Bank of America and Ally. While directly employed as counsel to JPMorgan Chase, Ceresney had played a pivotal role in directing the negotiations between the U.S. Justice Department, 49 state attorneys general and an array of Federal regulators to tie up with a neat little red ribbon charges of mortgage, foreclosure and servicing fraud into the infamous National Mortgage Settlement – a deal big on promises and short on cash.
The Assistant U.S. Attorney at the U.S. Justice Department who worked with Ceresney in cementing that deal was Thomas J. Perrelli. Not long thereafter, Perrelli re-joined Jenner & Block, a corporate law firm with Wall Street clients.
The National Mortgage Settlement or NMS, which was promoted as a $25 billion settlement, was announced in February of last year. To date, no hard cash to injured borrowers has been paid out. A statement was added to the settlement’s official web site yesterday (which, bizarrely, is adorned with gleefully happy homeowners). The statement advises that “Approximately $1.5 billion of the funds recovered in the national settlement are being used to compensate borrowers who lost their home to foreclosure during the period of January 1, 2008, to December 31, 2011… Checks to borrowers who submitted claim forms are expected to be mailed in 4 to 6 weeks. The exact amount of the payment to be made to each eligible claimant is not yet known but it is anticipated it will exceed the minimum payment of $840 that was indicated on the claim form.”
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