May 5, 2024
Loans

Assumable mortgages are easier to find in these cities — but there’s a catch

Assumable mortgages, or home loans that pass on their mortgage rate from a home seller to a buyer, are considered an attractive option these days: They effectively allow buyers to inherit a far lower interest rate at a time when mortgage rates are higher than 7%. And while these loans are relatively hard to find

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Investors

Bitcoin rallies to highest level since November 2021 as investors eye record high

Published: Feb. 26, 2024 at 10:28 p.m. ET Bitcoin on Monday rallied to its highest level since November 2021, as exchange-traded funds investing directly in the cryptocurrency attract more capital into the space, while investors await the upcoming “halving” event, which has historically been bullish for bitcoin prices.  Bitcoin BTCUSD rose 9.5% over the past

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Mortgage

Commercial Mortgage REITs Weathered Another Quarter. They’re Cheap Again.

The year-end reports have come in from a cadre of lenders who hold loans on some of the more troubled kinds of commercial real estate. The December quarter wasn’t easy for mortgage real estate investment trusts like Starwood Property Trust and Blackstone Mortgage Trust . Earnings calls among the dozen or so members of this

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Crypto

Bitcoin ETF activity has been ‘additive’ to crypto demand, says Robinhood CFO

Last Updated: Feb. 14, 2024 at 6:24 a.m. ET First Published: Feb. 14, 2024 at 4:29 a.m. ET One of the big concerns for investors in Coinbase Global is that the launch of spot bitcoin exchange-traded funds would hurt its main crypto brokerage. At one competitor, that’s not been the case. Robinhood Markets HOOD CFO

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Investors

What investors with $6.5 trln in cash should do while waiting for Fed rate cuts

The Federal Reserve’s pushback on expectations for interest-rate cuts over the past two weeks has investors closing watching inflation data and piling more cash into money-market funds. Investors stashed a record $6.48 trillion away in U.S. money-market funds through the end of January, with the balance growing as euphoria in December over a Fed policy

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Funds

China stocks rally after government fund says it will increase stock buys

NEW YORK (AP) — Shares are mixed in Asia, where Chinese markets advanced after a government investment fund said it would step up stock purchases. But the gains in Shanghai, Shenzhen and Hong Kong were much smaller than recent losses. Oil prices rose and U.S. futures were mixed. China’s Central Huijin Investment, a sovereign fund

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Crypto

Why crypto exchange Kraken’s security team lives in the shadows

Kraken’s chief security officer wants his 400-member team to stay away from social media as he believes their presence on platforms like Twitter and LinkedIn can create security risks for the crypto exchange. Nick Percoco has allowed only a handful of people from his team to publicly confirm their roles and has instructed the rest to work

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Loans

Aozora Bank Shares Tumble on U.S. Office-Loan Provisions, Foreign-Bond Losses

Published: Jan. 31, 2024 at 9:39 p.m. ET By Kosaku Narioka Aozora Bank shares fell sharply after it projected a fiscal-year net loss due to higher provisions for U.S. office loans as well as losses from foreign bonds. Shares were recently 21% lower at 2,557.0 yen, falling to the day’s trading limit on Thursday morning.

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Loans

New York Community Bancorp Stock Tanks as It Posts Sharp Loss, Slashes Dividend

New York Community Bancorp reported a surprise loss as it wrote down bad real estate loans, sending its stock tumbling Wednesday and dragging down the share prices of regional banks across the country. “This was a major negative surprise,” Jon G. Arfstrom, an analyst at RBC Capital Markets, said in a Wednesday note. New York

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Loans

Banks’ office-loan exposure remains a ‘mixed bag’ as lenders manage through downturn

Banks continue to navigate a bumpy landscape in loans tied to a drop in office-space value and rent prices in many markets as workers stay at home. In one high-profile example on Tuesday, New York Community Bancorp NYCB cited a need to increase its allowance for credit losses (ACL) on the heels of an office

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