New York attorneys general traditionally have made a name for themselves by going hard after Wall Street fraud. Will Eric Schneiderman join that list?

It seems that way given the news that he has subpoenaed lots of information related to mortgage-backed securities and requested meetings with the likes of Bank of America, Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley.

At this point, it's unclear exactly what aspects of the MBS, CDS and CDO construction, sales and trading processes he's looking at.

But it's fair to say that the well-publicized move once again raises the prospect of criminal charges, though you would have to rate the likelihood of such charges against individual executives as a longshot still.

This is one of many enforcement prongs that banks are grappling with. They recently agreed to consent decrees with various federal officials. Negotiations with state attorneys general are still underway. And the SEC is pondering charges against an array of firms (except Goldman Sachs, which has already settled) over various CDO and CDS issues.

Against this backdrop, firms have reserved against legal costs to the tune of billions. They are ready for all of this to be over, but it's unclear when that will be.

It will be very interesting to see what Schneiderman pulls out here. He has been staffing up in this area.

For more:
- here's a CNN article

Related Articles:
New York attorney general looks at credit rating agencies
Goldman Sachs hires from New York Attorney General
NY AG looking into Thain bonuses