Congress should encourage a large increase in the amount and types of risk-transfer transactions the GSEs take on, Rep. Ed Royce, R-CA, said while speaking on a panel focused on restarting the private market for mortgage credit. Royce said that would include both back-end and front-end risk sharing. “We also have to figure out how to promote risk-transfer transactions that allow access to all types and sizes of mortgage originators,” he said. Real estate investment trusts, for example, which account for just 2 percent of risk-sharing transactions, face regulatory challenges that limit their involvement. Stanford Kurland, CEO of PennyMac Financial Services, said it addressed some of the REIT issues in structuring its PennyMac Mortgage Investment Trust.