Somewhere in his private moments, Angelo Mozilo must be laughing his head off today.
After all, Angelo “earned” $10.8 million last year and cashed in on $121.5 million in stock gains as his company, Countrywide Financial (CFC), got absolutely hammered by losses on idiotic mortgage loans. Not a bad payout.
In fact, all told Mozilo made over $450 million on sales of CFC stock as the company he founded began to fall apart.
But his best work was saved for Bank of America CEO Kenneth Lewis.
That’s because somehow Angelo and his friends managed to convince Lewis to buy his sinking boat before it went to the bottom. Now that’s what I call a slick salesman.
Here, by the way, is the latest earnings report from the troubled lender. It is ugly.
The troubled lender lost $1.60 a share in the 1st quarter, which was in another universe compared to the 2 cent profit that most analysts were expecting.OOPS.
Here’s the skinny.
From AP by Alex Veiga entitled: Countrywide loses $893 million in 1Q on rising loss reserve
“Countrywide Financial Corp., the nation’s largest mortgage lender and servicer, said Tuesday it lost $893 million during the first quarter due to a sharp increase in its provision to gird against unpaid home mortgage loans amid a deepening housing downturn
The latest results marked the third consecutive quarterly loss for Countrywide, which agreed in January to sell itself to Bank of America Corp. for about $4 billion in stock.
Calabasas, Calif.-based Countrywide said it lost $893 million, or $1.60 per share, for the quarter ended March 31 compared with earnings of $434 million, or 72 cents per share, in the same period a year earlier.
Revenue plunged 72 percent to $679 million from $2.4 billion in the year-ago quarter.
Analysts polled by Thomson Financial, on average, forecast earnings of 2 cents per share.
The results were hurt as the company was forced to set aside $1.5 billion to cover loan losses, up from $158 million in the year-ago period. Charge-offs, or loans written off as not being repaid, totaled $606 million during the quarter, compared with $39 million in the same quarter last year, the company said.
The lender raised its reserve for credit losses to $3.4 billion by the close of the quarter.
Countrywide said the increase in credit-related charges were driven by rising mortgage delinquencies and defaults. Falling home values also forced the lender to cut back its previous expectations for home prices in its loan portfolio.
The mortgage lender recorded an impairment charge of $347 million during the quarter related to securities backed by home equity lines of credit.
Because of continued deterioration in the credit markets, Countrywide also took a loss of $394 million as it transferred loans to a held-for-investment portfolio.”
So somewhere while Angelo is chuckling, Kenneth Lewis must be kicking himself a bit.
Of course, it will be interesting to see if Bank of America really does close this deal, because it is getting more and more questionable by the day.
August can’t get here fast enough for Angelo. Suckers.
