Reuters - Fannie Mae , the largest U.S. home funding company, believes that failed mortgage lender IndyMac has obligations to repurchase around $1 billion of home mortgages that failed to meet Fannie's standards, the Wall Street Journal said, citing people familiar with the situation.

AP - Citigroup Inc. is in advanced talks with lawmakers on a plan to let bankruptcy judges alter home loans in an effort to prevent foreclosures, a person briefed on the matter said Thursday.

AFP - German Finance Minister Peer Steinbrueck is mulling a cut in the base income tax rate to 12 percent from 15 percent to help pull Europe's biggest economy out of a deep recession, a spokesman said Friday.

AP - Shareholders in nationalized mortgage lender Northern Rock were going to court Tuesday to try to force the British government to compensate them for their now-worthless stocks.

BusinessWeek Online - The growing urgency to implement an effective fix for the deepening U.S. financial crisis is pushing policymakers to consider measures that were roundly rejected as too risky not very long ago. The limited success of the first $350 billion in TARP funds and the government's wavering on how best to dispose of the toxic assets that are clogging banks' balance sheets -- and preventing a rebound in the credit markets -- has added to the sense of urgency.

Reuters - The Obama administration plans to tighten the nation's financial regulatory system, including stricter federal rules for hedge funds, credit rating agencies and mortgage brokers, the New York Times reported in Sunday editions.

AP - A well-known Bollywood promoter in northern Virginia was sentenced to seven years in prison Friday for one of the largest bank fraud scams in the region's history.