Business

Creditors of Rescap say Ally kept their bailout $

Creditors of bankrupt mortgage lender Residential Capital are opening up a new line of attack in their legal battle with parent Ally Financial.

ResCap creditors will claim in a court filing as early as today that Ally kept billions in government bailout dollars that should have gone to its troubled mortgage unit, The Post has learned.

The creditors will argue that Ally allocated less than $1 billion in aid to help struggling ResCap. Ally received a $17.2 billion crisis-era bailout and still owes Uncle Sam more than $11 billion.

Ally, which is 74 percent owned by the government, is trying to limit its exposure to ResCap’s mortgage business so it can repay the government and focus on its core auto-lending and online-bank businesses.

But unsecured creditors, including insurance giants AIG and MBIA, are pushing Ally to cough up more money to settle the potential legal liabilities it faces as ResCap’s parent.

The unsecured creditors will seek permission to sue Ally in a bid to make it pay for more of ResCap’s losses.

In 2005, Ally, formerly known as GMAC, split off ResCap as a separate company in an attempt to limit the mortgage unit’s exposure to the auto business, which at the time was the more troubled of the two businesses.

The creditors, however, will allege Ally was never truly separate from ResCap, according to a source familiar with the situation.

Ally, for example, told the rating agencies that there would be different officers for each company even though the same officers sat on both boards, the filing will claim.

“The allegation is meritless,” an Ally spokeswoman said. “The taxpayer investment Ally received was to help stabilize and support the US auto industry during the financial crisis and ensure that thousands of auto dealers and millions of consumers had appropriate access to credit.”

ResCap filed for bankruptcy in May 2012. Despite selling almost all its assets, it has had a hard time reaching a deal with its unsecured creditors on how to distribute the proceeds.

ResCap has the exclusive right until April 30 to file a reorganization.

Ally has offered to contribute more than $750 million to the ResCap reorganization, but unsecured creditors want the parent kick in billions more.

“At this point, it is time for [the unsecured creditors] to take the pin out of the grenade,” a source said.

ResCap declined to comment.

jkosman@nypost.com