Delaware Suit Targeting MERS Ends With A Wimper; State AG Scrambles To Save Face, Accepts Crappy Settlement

In Dover, Delaware, The Associated Press reports:

• The Delaware attorney general’s office has agreed to drop a deceptive trade practices lawsuit against a company that runs a nationwide electronic mortgage registry. Attorney General Beau Biden announced a settlement with Virginia-based Mortgage Electronic Registration Systems Inc. [].
  
  The settlement was reached after a judge expressed skepticism about the state’s claims at a May hearing on MERS’ motion to dismiss the lawsuit.
  
  MERS was set up by the banking industry to rapidly package and sell mortgages as securities without recording each transaction in county recorder offices.
  
  Biden’s office argued that the MERS registry is riddled with inaccuracies that raise questions about the rights of homeowners facing foreclosure, including trying to find out who owns the underlying loan.
  
  MERS argued that state officials couldn’t point to any deception of consumers because the registry operates solely for the benefit of its member financial institutions and does not provide any goods or services to homeowners.

For more, see Delaware attorney general settles lawsuit against nationwide electronic mortgage registry.

See also:

• American Banker: Delaware AG Settlement Secures MERS Audit Reports, But Little Else,
• Thomson Reuters: What's missing from Delaware's settlement with MERS?