Wells Fargo, Mortgage | featured news

Two of the nation's largest banks released third-quarter results that suggest the U.S. housing market, a key factor in the nation's economic performance, is bouncing back as mortgage rates hit record lows and home refinancings surge.

The nation's largest mortgage lender said revenue from mortgage banking jumped almost 80% and consumers borrowed more on their credit cards. But it called the economic recovery uneven.

Wells Fargo Bank will pay at least $175 million to settle accusations that it discriminated against African-American and Hispanic borrowers in violation of fair-lending laws, the Justice Department announced Thursday.

The new center of U.S. mortgage lending is a nondescript office building in the American heartland, far from the California subprime lenders and the New York investment banks that drove the housing market into a bust.

Wells Fargo's profit jumped 13 percent in the first three months of the year, thanks to strong mortgage lending and a drop in delinquent loans, the bank said Friday.

In a ruling that may affect foreclosures nationwide, the Massachusetts high court has voided the seizure of two homes by Wells Fargo & Company and US Bancorp after the banks failed to show that they held the mortgages at the time of the foreclosures.