UBS just announced another ugly write-down, $14 billion and a $4 billion loss for 2008, and that won't be the last of it for the industry. How can the former CEOs continue to hold their millions when it was based on such bogus business? Now that the investigation is moving, will anything come of it?
The Federal Bureau of Investigation has opened criminal inquiries into 14 companies as part of a wide-ranging investigation of the troubled mortgage industry, F.B.I. officials said Tuesday.
The F.B.I. said it was looking into possible accounting fraud, insider trading or other violations in connection with loans made to borrowers with weak, or subprime, credit.
The agency declined to identify the companies under investigation but said the inquiry, which began last spring, involves companies across the financial industry, including mortgage lenders, loan brokers and Wall Street banks that packaged home loans into securities.
