"Capitalism in the West thrives because of our ability to legally transfer property, with confidence and certitude. Only, not so much any more."
-- Barry Ritholtz
But wait, there's more:
"And we will see that at every step along the process, the reckless rush for easy profits has systemically undermined these legal property rights — how mortgages are recorded, the bungled bundling of notes to be securitized, the electronic system that fictionalized the process of assembling transfer documents, and how all the players along the way — The investment firms, banks, law firms, even court system, utterly lost sight of what they were doing.
If de Soto were to come to the United States today and review all of this, he would see a system that ignores its own laws, cheats on process, engages in wanton fraud, and is in danger of sliding not just backwards to the 18th century, but slipping towards a third world nation of dubious legal protections and the worst form of crony capitalism.
Welcome to 21st century America."
