MORTGAGE

Interest rates on the 30-year, fixed-rate mortgage rose above 4 percent for the first time since October 2011, following increases in bond yields, Freddie Mac reported.

Ninety-five-year-old actress and great-aunt of Paris Hilton, Zsa Zsa Gabor, has been in and out of the hospital since the early 2000's. The ailing 95-year-old is making headlines as her much younger husband, Prince Frederic Von Anhalt and her daughter, Constance, Francesa Hilton, prepare to duke it out in court over a conservatorship of Gabor.

U.S. existing home sales fell to 4.59 million in February, 0.9 percent below upwardly revised sales figures in January, the National Association of Realtors (NAR) said Wednesday.

The Federal Reserve plans to fine eight more bank holding companies for improper home mortgage foreclosures, the latest fallout from the so-called robo-signing scandal in which banks filed foreclosure documents without verifying their accuracy.

Last week's rise in 10-year U.S. Treasury yields from 2.0 percent to 2.3 percent suggests that it might not be long before mortgage rates increase from their current record low of just above 4 percent, according to Capital Economics.

In Sweden, monetary transactions made with physical cash are down to three percent of the national economy... and the rest of the world may be closer to cashless than you think.

Washington Mutual Inc , one of the biggest corporate casualties of the 2008 financial crisis, on Monday emerged from bankruptcy protection, just two weeks after Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc also emerged from Chapter 11.

The Treasury Department said on Monday it made a $25 billion profit on sales of mortgage-backed securities acquired during the financial crisis, part of its ongoing efforts to wind down taxpayer-financed bailout programs.

You can't blame investors for feeling a bit squeamish regarding deploying new money in the U.S. stock market these days, despite the Dow Jones Industrial Average's (DJIA) recent rise to 13,000. Where's the Dow headed in the next three months?

U.S. mortgage rates rose with the improving economy, but remained near historic lows in the week ending March 15, Freddie Mac reported Thursday.

The inspector general for the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development said banks involved in the nationwide settlement on foreclosure practices significantly hindered its investigation.

Finally, a mall the founder of the Mormon faith, Joseph Smith, could warm up to ... though it may not be the best shopping spot for your run-of-the-mill teenager.

Demand for home purchases picked up for the third week in a row last week, though applications for refinancing sagged, an industry group said on Wednesday.

The companies whose shares are moving in pre-market trade on Wednesday are: Francesca's Holdings Corp, Zions Bancorporation, Regions Financial Co, RADVision Ltd, Clearwire Corp, LSI Corp, SunTrust Banks, Citigroup, American Capital Mortgage Investment Corp and Fifth Third Bancorp.

Five major U.S. banks have agreed to pay $25 million to New York State over their use of an electronic mortgage database that the state said resulted in deceptive and illegal practices that led to more than 13,000 foreclosures.

Top banks impeded a federal inquiry into their foreclosure processes, according to a report released Tuesday, dragging their feet on turning over documents and blocking investigators' attempts to interview bank employees.

A full-text of the Federal Open Market Committee's statement from March 13 meeting.

JPMorgan Chase & Co is paying the federal government $45 million to settle a lawsuit alleging it charged veterans hidden fees in mortgage refinancings.

The government released the fine print of its landmark $25 billion mortgage settlement, and promised to closely police the banks' pledges to bring widespread housing relief, even while letting them dodge admission of wrongdoing.

Economists agree the current labor recovery is creating some jobs, but disagree as to which groups will benefit the most -- and what American society will end up looking like -- as a result. Their disagreements are full of useful insight that could be the base for future policies, if only policymakers were listening.

The $25 billion settlement between five large U.S. banks accused of abusive mortgage practices on the one side and federal and state government officials on the other side that was announced Feb. 9 will be filed in federal court on Monday, people familiar with the matter said.