What a year! We saw the death of America’s most hated enemy, the uprising of the Occupy movement and a few too many close calls when it comes to the U.S. government budget.
2011 had its share of ups and downs for sure, especially when it comes to finance. Here’s a month-by-month look at the biggest financial news topics of the year and links to the full stories.
January: JP Morgan Chase Overcharges Military Mortgage Holders
2011 was a year wrought by mortgage scandals and wrongful foreclosures, and JP Morgan Chase was the first to kick it all off when they admitted to overcharging several thousand families on their military mortgages. Even worse, about a dozen families were foreclosed on when they couldn’t make the mortgage payments they were being overcharged on by the bank.
This admission came as a result of an investigation by NBC, after Marine Capt. Jonathan Rowles sued JP Morgan Chase for violating Servicemembers Civil Relief Act (SCRA).
February: Patrick Rodgers Forecloses on Wells Fargo
Picking up where Chase left off, Wells Fargo was the next major bank to come under fire for mistreating a mortgage holder.
When Patrick Rodgers was forced by his mortgage provider, Wells Fargo, to insure his home for its full replacement value instead of the purchase price ($1,000,000 instead of $180,000), he took the bank to court.
Rodger won his case, but when Wells Fargo refused to pay up, he threatened to foreclose on their N. Delaware Ave office to cover the judgment and additional court and sheriff’s costs. Not surprisingly, the bank settled.
March: Japan Quake Rocks Markets
The devastating earthquake and subsequent tsunamis that hit Japan in March also hit global markets hard. The Japan earthquake sent the Nikkei Index on a downward spiral, and the U.S. stock market soon followed.
Additionally, the auto industry lost ground as Japanese auto manufactures were forced to come to a halt due to power outages.
April: Government Budget Problems Almost Result in Shutdown
Though we were well into April, the 2011 budget had never been approved by Congress. Instead, lawmakers passed six short-term spending bills, known as “continuous resolutions,” through March. The final extension was set to expire in April, leaving Congress hours to come to a budget agreement or else face a total government shutdown.
Had the shutdown occurred, Americans would have faced a number of disastrous consequences–federal employees and members of the military would not have been paid, the FHA would have stopped operating and tax returns would not be mailed out.
May: Osama Bin Laden Death Rallies Markets
Another major world event rocked markets in May, this time positively. Following the the killing of Osama Bin Laden by U.S. forces in Abbottabad, the stock market opened significantly higher that Monday.
Obama called his death “the most significant achievement to date in our nation’s effort to defeat al Qaeda.”
The Dow Jones industrial average rose 56 points (0.5 percent), the S&P 500 climbed 5 points (0.4 percent) and the Nasdaq Composite gained 8 points (0.3 percent).
June: Couple Threatens to Foreclose on Bank of America
Following the lead of Patrick Rodgers, a Florida couple threatened to foreclose on Bank of America when the bank also refused to pay up for attorney fees.
Maureen Collier and her husband, Sgt. Warren Nyerges, sued BofA after the bank first attempted to foreclose on their home–even though they didn’t even have a mortgage. After refusing to pay what the court awarded the couple, Collier and Nyerges simple turned the tables.
The couple, their lawyer, a moving company and two sheriff’s deputies showed up to the bank’s office and demanded BofA pay, or the equivalent amount in furniture would be taken and sold at public auction.
July: Gov’t Comes Close to Defaulting on U.S. Debt
After the U.S. debt ceiling was reached in May, the government was forced to come up with a solution (i.e., raise the debt ceiling) or else risk default on August 2. Though the government had over 11 weeks to come to an agreement about how the debt situation would be handled, things once again came down to the wire as Congress argued over solutions and almost put Social Security benefits and Medicare on the chopping block.
August: U.S. Credit Downgraded
After members of the U.S. government put their own personal agendas ahead of the well being of the nation, Standard and Poor’s decided to downgrade the U.S. credit rating from AAA to AA+, which marked the first U.S. credit downgrade in history.
This downgrade effected everything from stock prices to interest rates, though the long-term consequences are yet to be seen.
September: Bank of America Announces Debit Card Fee
Bank of America took the spotlight once again in September, when it announced it would begin charging checking account customers a $5 per month debit card fee. Little did the mega-bank know that this would spark backlash so great, a global protest movement would soon emerge, known as Occupy Wall Street.
October: Obama’s Jobs Plan Falls Through
The hotly anticipated jobs plan created by President Obama was shot down by the Senate after it received too few votes.
The jobs plan, officially known as the American Jobs Act, was a $447 billion plan that proposed a number of tax cuts and spending adjustments to reduce the national deficit, boost hiring and push the stalled economy into motion.
November: First Ever Bank Transfer Day
In response to the public outrage over unfair bank fees, the first annual Bank Transfer Day was created in an effort to publicize the benefits of non-profit financial institutions and encourage consumers to transfer from a major bank to a local credit union.
California and Texas were among the states to see the biggest shift to credit unions, while in Charlotte, NC, Charlotte Metro Federal Credit Union alone recieved 1,400 new checking accounts in the month leading up to BTD, compared to an average of 400.
December: Undecided
December 2011 isn’t quite over, so you tell us: What do you think was the biggest event in financial news this month? How about for the whole year?
