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ACC Capital Holdings (ACCCH) was a national mortgage lender based in Orange, California. The company is the largest privately held retail mortgage lender in the United States and the largest subprime lender by volume. ACCCH was founded by Roland Arnall. As well as Ameriquest Mortgage, the company also owned Argent Mortgage which made wholesale loans through mortgage brokers, and AMC Mortgage Services which carried out customer services activities for all ACCCH mortgages. Ameriquest closed in 2007, and the rest of the company was acquired by Citigroup. ==Company reorganization== The risky nature of subprime loans, massive defaults of those loans, the softening of the real estate market, and ACC's own practices have led to a financial crisis: *In early 2006, Ameriquest Mortgage settled a class action lawsuit for US$325 million with the attorneys general of 49 of the 50 states over allegations of predatory lending practices. Allegations included usury and bait-and-switch tactics. *On May 2, 2006, ACC Capital Holdings announced the closure of all of its Ameriquest Mortgage branch offices as part of a plan to consolidate its retail mortgage lending operations into four regional call centers.〔(Branch closure )〕 Thousands of employees were fired via conference call. The employees were given five minutes to get their personal belongings and leave the office. Ameriquest would soon be joined by other American mortgage companies in announcing massive layoffs. On February 28, 2007 ACC Capital Holdings announced that Citi was providing working capital and access to credit. Citi also gained the option to purchase Argent and AMC, but this option did not extend to Ameriquest.〔LA Times article on ACCCH and Citigroup, retrieved 3/11/2007]〕 On September 9, 2007, Argent Mortgage was sold to Citi for an undisclosed amount. Argent was renamed Citi Residential Lending. Citi Residential Lending operated for several months before it was shut down. On September 10, 2007, Ameriquest (stopped accepting loan applications ). Former employees from Ameriquest, which was United States's leading wholesale lender,〔 described a system in which they were pushed to falsify documents on bad Ameriquest Mortgages and then sell them to Wall Street banks eager to make fast profits.〔 There is growing evidence that such mortgage fraud may be at the heart of the Financial crisis of 2007–2010.〔''(Road to Ruin: Mortgage Fraud Scandal Brewing )'' May 13, 2009 by American News Project hosted by The Real News〕 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「ACC Capital Holdings」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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