Indymac Bancorp

Battling rumors that it may collapse, Pasadena-based IndyMac Bancorp acknowledged Monday that its financial position had deteriorated but described the fears as overblown and said it was working with regulators to improve its "safety and soundness." IndyMac, a national home lender burned by the mortgage meltdown, went public after depositors lined up at San Gabriel Valley branches starting Friday to pull out their money.

IndyMac Bancorp Inc. canceled Chief Executive Michael Perry's option to purchase 1 million shares of company stock after it reported its first-ever annual loss. Perry asked the board of the Pasadena-based mortgage lender to make the move "solely upon his own initiative" so that IndyMac could make more options available for future grants to other employees, according to a regulatory filing.

Mortgage lender IndyMac Bancorp Inc. warned that deepening turmoil in debt markets could have a negative effect on the value of its mortgage-backed securities, hurting the company's first-quarter earnings. The danger comes from widening credit spreads amid "panic market conditions" stemming from uncertainty over the economy, the housing and mortgage sectors, as well as increased margin calls by hedge funds and other Wall Street investors, Pasadena-based IndyMac said in a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

Shares of Pasadena-based IndyMac Bancorp tumbled 20% on Monday after the mortgage bank reported higher delinquencies in January and a sharp drop in loan production compared to a year earlier. In other bad mortgage news, Calabasas-based leader Countrywide Financial Corp. reported a surge in delinquencies on risky loans known as pay-option adjustable rate mortgages, or option ARMs. And the stocks of two companies that buy home loans or mortgage-backed securities -- Thornburg Mortgage Inc. and Deerfield Capital Inc. -- lost half their value on developments disclosed by the firms.

IndyMac Bancorp Inc. reported the first annual loss in company history Tuesday and scrapped its dividend to shore up capital. The holding company for IndyMac swung to a fourth-quarter loss as weakness in the housing market forced the mortgage lender to boost provisions for future credit losses from rising defaults, repossessions and other costs. That and the collapse of Wall Street's demand for home loans led to a loss of $509.1 million, or $6.43 a share, for the quarter that ended Dec. 31.

Countrywide Financial Corp., IndyMac Bancorp Inc. and 23 other defendants were sued by homeowners asking for $100 million in mortgage-fraud damages and a halt in debt collection and foreclosures. The 24 homeowners claim that they were victims of a Ponzi scheme, according to a suit filed in state court in Mineola, N.Y., by lawyer Jacob Zamansky. The homeowners sued in November, claiming that they had been duped into taking out mortgages and investing the proceeds.

IndyMac Bancorp said Monday that its third-quarter earnings rose 59% over the like period a year earlier, as the Pasadena-based thrift and mortgage bank captured a growing share of the home loan market and benefited from accounting changes. IndyMac earned $79.3 million, or $1.18 a share, on revenue of $283 million. That's up from earnings of $49.7 million, or 78 cents a share, on revenue of $204 million during the same period in 2004.

Pasadena mortgage lender IndyMac Bancorp reported a 47.6% surge in first-quarter earnings Wednesday as low interest rates produced record numbers of loans made or in the pipeline. IndyMac, which specializes in online lending, earned $36.9 million, or 66 cents a share, compared with $25 million, or 39 cents, in the first quarter of 2002. Completed mortgage loans totaled $6.5 billion, up 59% from a year earlier.