Matt Levine, Columnist

Goldman Puts Mortgages and Naked Shorts Behind It

Goldman never gave out many mortgages, but it will have to give out a lot of mortgage relief.

January 15, 2016 at 10:15 PM UTC

Matt Levine is a Bloomberg Opinion columnist. A former investment banker at Goldman Sachs, he was a mergers and acquisitions lawyer at Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz; a clerk for the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 3rd Circuit; and an editor of Dealbreaker.

Provide news feedback or report an error

Site feedback:

Take our Survey

Here's some good news if you have a mortgage with Goldman Sachs1452880770535:

That agreement in principle will "resolve claims from authorities including the Department of Justice and New York and Illinois attorneys general for the bank’s securitization, underwriting and sale of bonds from 2005 to 2007," and is the latest in a series of gigantic settlements between the government's mortgage task force and the big banks. As with the other settlements, a big chunk of this one consists of consumer relief: Because the banks' mortgage misdeeds hurt homeowners, the banks have to help homeowners to balance out the scales.