The nations largest mortgage originator reported their fourth quarter earnings report on Tuesday.

Countrywide for only the 2nd quarter in the past ten years posted a loss on their earnings of over 400 million dollars. Their overall loan production for the 4th quarter of 2007 was cut almost in half due to the decline in the secondary marketplace for non agency generated mortgage loans. The net result of back to back disappointing quarters was the sale of the company earlier this month to Bank of America. Countrywide's ultimate demise has been the free fall of the U.S. housing industry which in 2007 saw almost $12,000 in equity lost on average for every household in the country. The rate of home foreclosures climbed over 1% for all houses in inventory, up over 45 basis points from 2006. The fallout experienced by Countrywide is similar to the crash of the dot com era for many stocks and difficult for investors who have seen the companies value drop from over twenty billion to just over four billion when they agreed to the Bank of America offer earlier this month. Banking stocks have been hit especially hard with the fall of the housing market and credit crunch that started in July of 2007.

1-30-2008©LowRateMortgage.com

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