Name that Financial Institution

Via Susie Madrak, Columbia Journalism Review has a humdinger of an article about what we do know about the various financial institutions' behavior and how the media should be telling us even more. This didn't all just happen to us. From the article, a little quiz, match the financial institution with the allegation:

Allegation

1. Handed out copies of the movie Boiler Room as a training tape

2. Partnered to sell its “PayOption Arms” with a brokerage owned by a five-time felon, whose convictions included gun-related charges

3. Forbade loan officers to check borrower income on certain loans

4. Ran an “art department” in its Tampa office, where documents were altered

5. Settled allegations of institutionalized marketing deception that covered two million customers

6. Developed “FastQual,” a program designed to approve borrowers in twelve seconds

7. Incentivized brokers and loan officers through “yield spread premiums” and other compensation schemes to put borrowers into more expensive loans

8. Tapped two kegs of beer at weekly staff meetings

Institution

A. Citigroup

B. Countrywide

C. Ameriquest

D. IndyMac

E. Merit Financial

F. New Century

G. All of the above

Fun fact - one of the institutions did three of the things.

Before I give out the answers, let me say I once represented brokers straight out of Boiler Room and that was years before the movie was made. Here's a tip, if some guy calls you up and tells you he'll make you a million dollars if you send him a thousand, don't do it. Whether he's in Nigeria or on Wall Street, it's still a scam. And I know everyone here knows it's a scam, but a shocking number of well-educated people fall for it. My guys loved doctors. Doctors apparently had money and were really stupid with it (because, of course, they're so smart, nobody would ever dare try to take them?).

Quiz Answers: 1C, 2B, 3D, 4C, 5A, 6F, 7G, 8E. And if you said Ameriquest was the entity that hit the trifecta (1, 4, and 7) you'd be right. I particularly like the "art department." Creative class, anyone?