The hearing was originally said to be held last month, but was postponed to allow the committee to gather more information. The hearing is expected to be mainly on Bank of America’s $50 billion acquisition of troubled investment bank Merrill Lynch (NYSE:NMQ). Moynihan was the company’s chief legal counsel at the time the deal is expected to testify a long with Timothy J. Mayopoulos the former Bank of America chief counsel.

Bank of America has been accused of misleading shareholders about the acquisition by failing to disclose the extent of Merrill Lynch’s mounting losses, and the fact that Bank of America gave Merrill Lynch permission to issue as much as $5.8 billion in bonuses.

To read more on this story go to boston.com.

As we mentioned in a recent post CIT Group became one of the largest corporate bankruptcies in history. The $71 billion bank holding company has nearly $65 billion in liabilities, and the bankruptcy is being used as a chance to refinance debt obligations and come out leaner and stronger.

However CIT will not be taking on new customers for the foreseeable future. That means small businesses have lost a major financing resource, But that doesn’t mean small businesses that want to expand have no other options. Lending has increased dramatically in the second half of the year. Since the economic stimulus package went into effect in February, the average number of loans approved each week has grown by more than 50%. according to the Small Business Administration.

So if you have a vision, you can still get funding, as long as you’re prepared to work hard for it and tick all the boxes. To read more on this story go to thestreet.com.

The losses have come from the increased costs of buying bad mortgage backed loans as part of the government’s efforts to support the housing market. Freddie Mac (NYSE:FRE) was also taken under government control last year as well as Fannie Mae. Both companies request takes the amount that the pair has asked for from the US Treasury to more than $100bn.

Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac buy mortgages from approved lenders then sell them to investors. Both these companies make up half of all US mortgages, worth more than $5 trillion. Next year, the US government will unveil its plans for the two mortgage giants.

To read more on this story go to bbc.co.uk. How long can Governments around the world keep bailing out financial institutions? Let us know your thoughts.

The program will also include existing home owners. The tax credit expansion is applicable to current homeowners, who are buying a new primary residence, only if they have owned their home for five consecutive years in the previous eight. Homeowners will be able to apply for tax credits of up to $6,500, when they purchase their next home.

To qualify, buyers will have to sign a purchase agreement by April 30, 2010 and close by June 30, 2010 unless in the military. The maximum purchase price on a home will be $800,000. Income limitations are $125,000 for single tax payers and $225,000 for joint filers.

Around 1.4 million first-time home buyers have qualified for the program, according to the National Association of Realtors. To read more on this story go to chinohills.com.

AIG said its net income rose to $455 million, or 68 cents per share, an improvement over the $24.5 billion loss from a year earlier. Sales for the New York-based company rose 189% to $26 billion, topping analysts’ forecasts of $23 billion.

Robert Benmosche the Chief Executive for AIG said employees are working to preserve the strength of our insurance businesses in a challenging market.”

In August, AIG reported that it had returned to profitability after six straight losing quarters. The return to more solid footing also put the company in a better position to pay back the $89.3 billion it owes taxpayers.

To read more on this story go to money.cnn.com.

They are also offering and a two year tracker deal, available from 2.78 per cent up to 70 per cent LTV. Existing borrowers moving home can borrow up to 95 per cent LTV is a good start from Nationwide however new customers this is restricted to 85%.

There are also some good remortgage deals, mortgage director at Nationwide Andy McQueen said “We are making 19 individual rate cuts of up to 0.31 per cent on some of our house purchase and remortgage products. This, together with the special offers we recently announced for first time buyers and house purchasers, will be good news for those trying to get on the housing ladder or secure a new home.”

To see what other rates are available go to introducertoday.co.uk. Do you think banks and building societies should do more for first time buyers? Let us know your thoughts.

Thursday’s 25 billion pound increase in the BoE’s asset buying plan was less than some who predicted of 50 billion pounds The pound traded close to a two week high against a weak dollar. Head of currency research at Barclays Capital David Woo Said “clearly people are still trying to digest the news yesterday and to assess the implications for sterling of the end of QE.”

He went on to say “there is the question that if the Bank of England is buying fewer gilts, will that mean more foreign investors will be buying them?” Hope that U.S. employment data may show a slowing pace of jobs losses stoked some risk appetite and helped prod the safe-haven U.S. currency lower.

To read more on this story go to reuters.com.

Savills, which is Britain’s largest publicly traded commercial real estate adviser, said property values won’t return to their 2007 peak until 2014. Prices rose unexpectedly this year as a shortage of properties available as the number of transactions fell to the lowest in at least 50 years.

Head of residential research at Savills Yolande Barnes said “It’s all about cash, and the true recovery will be credit dependent. Barnes also predicted that mortgage lending will be constrained for about five more years. To read more on this story go to bloomberg.com. What do you think will happen to UK house prices? Let us know your thoughts.

Quantitative easing is where the Bank of England uses its computers to create new money. It will then inject this into the economy in ways designed to get money flowing but without creating inflation. If they simple give money away it would instantly create inflation, it instead buys assets.

The Bank of England has bought gilts, which are loans to the UK government. It buys these mainly from insurers and pension companies, on the hope that this frees up money for them to help companies when they are trying to raise money. The theory is that more cash is available for lending to consumers, and businesses at more favorable rates.

The biggest danger is the creation of inflation. QE is to stop the UK falling into a deflationary spiral. Pumping money into the economy creates inflationary pressures. It is pretty much untried and unclear what other side effects may be created. If the economy continues to languish, expect more quantitative easing. Some pessimists even speculate that QE may even become a permanent fixture in the UK.

To read more on this story go to thisismoney.co.uk. What are your thoughts on Britain using quantitative easing?

Fund manager at private bank Brown Shipley & Co John Smith said “RBS is still a recovering basket case, but it’s going in the right direction.” The net loss was 1.8 billion pounds, compared with a profit of 871 million pounds in the year earlier period. This was not good news but it could have been worse. The shares gained as much as 8.6 percent in London trading.

RBS is the world’s most expensive bank bailout getting a total of 45.5 billion pounds in capital from the British taxpayer. This week, the 70 percent government owned lender said it would sell its insurance assets, more than 300 U.K. branches, an investment banking division and a credit card payment unit to win EU approval for taxpayer aid.

To read more on this story go to bloomberg.com.