WaMu’s CEO is saying that the subprime meltdown isn’t just magically going away:

“The combination of rising delinquencies, higher foreclosures, more housing inventories, increasing interest rates on many mortgages and greatly reduced availability of mortgages due to limited liquidity is creating what we call a near-perfect storm for housing,” Chief Executive Officer Kerry Killinger said.

“It now appears that housing and capital market corrections will be worse and longer lasting than even we expected,” Killinger said.

Meanwhile, Countrywide, the nations largest mortgage lender, announced over the weekend that they would cut between 10,000 and 12,000 jobs, or 20% of their workforce. Countrywide had previously announced 1,400 jobs cuts. Their stock is down 57% in 2007.

Countrywide to cut more jobs [MSNMoney]
Washington Mutual Sees Housing `Near-Perfect Storm’ [Bloomberg]
(Photo:Maulleigh)

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