Publicly traded banks reported strong gains in mortgage-banking income during the third quarter, according to a new Inside Mortgage Trends analysis of earnings releases. A diverse group of 26 banks that includes all the top lender-servicers and a number of regional players reported a combined $3.853 billion in mortgage-banking profits for the third quarter of 2016. That was up 23.5 percent from the previous period, and it was the strongest quarterly showing ... [Includes one data chart]

So far, the third quarter has seen several publicly traded commercial banks mark up the asset value of their residential mortgage servicing rights, but in general, the increases have been mild, to say the least. The only bank that reported a sizeable increase was Bank of America, which valued its MSR portfolio at 60 basis points at Sept. 30, an increase of 9 bps from mid-year. Of the reporting banks, BofA’s improvement has been the largest by far. BofA’s megabank competitor ...

Borrower retention – convincing a borrower to take a mortgage with their existing lender when the time comes for a new mortgage – can increase the value of servicing a new mortgage by 1.5 times to 3.0 times, according to calculations by Strategic Mortgage Finance Group. Matt Lind, a senior partner at Stratmor, came to that conclusion when considering the value of customer retention beyond trying to glean insight from the market price of servicing used in correspondent ...

The GSEs said treating items like payoffs, holdbacks and principal curtailments as closing costs in the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau’s disclosures would just confuse borrowers. Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac submitted comments to the CFPB last week in response to the bureau’s proposed amendments to the integrated disclosure requirements under the Truth in Lending Act and Real Estate Settlement Procedures Act. The comments focused primarily on aspects of the proposed rule that may potentially affect the Uniform Closing Dataset developed by the GSEs. The GSEs disagreed with the proposed rule’s plan to lump non-closing cost fees under...

The first-time homebuyer share of home purchases has declined significantly in recent months, according to the Campbell/Inside Mortgage Finance HousingPulse Tracking Survey. First-time homebuyers had a 34.8 percent share of purchases in September, based on a three-month moving average. That was the lowest share for first-time homebuyers since August 2014. The first-timer share has declined for four consecutive months, from 40.4 percent in May. Both current homeowners ...

The Cato Institute recently filed an amicus brief challenging the Federal Housing Finance Agency’s denial of compensation benefits to a former Freddie Mac CFO at the start of the conservatorship. The FHFA terminated Anthony Piszel two weeks after the government took over the GSEs in September 2008. The primary issue was whether a government prohibition on making golden parachute (severance) payments to terminated Freddie employees was illegal or not. Piszel appealed a judgment from the U.S. Court of Federal Claims dismissing his complaint that Freddie breached its contract and owed him payment for his golden parachute compensation.

Some leading mortgage technology vendors told the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau they are concerned about the resources that will be required to implement the changes the bureau wants to make to its integrated disclosure rule known as TRID. In a comment letter to the CFPB regarding its proposed rule to clarify a number of aspects of the TRID regulation, the Mortgage Vendor Regulatory Work Group raised concerns about software implementation resources, including ...

Housing Finance Agency’s proposal to loosen regulation of new business activities by the Federal Home Loan Banks generally showed support for the changes but recommended further exclusions from the definition of “new business activities.” The comment period ended on Oct. 24 and the FHLBanks commended the FHFA for its “thoughtful proposal.” Nevertheless, it noted that it would still like to see the agency adopt proposed enhancements to the new business activity regulation. Back in 2013, the FHLBanks wrote the FHFA about their concerns with the burden of existing regulations. The FHLBanks said that the broad scope of the rule requires them to spend a large amount of time and effort determining whether a proposed activity is...

Fairholme Files Motion to Force Government to Produce Docs ASAP. Plaintiffs in Fairholme Funds Inc. v. United States, et al, filed an emergency enforcement motion this week arguing that the government is purposely taking too long to produce documents and requesting unnecessary extensions. “The defendant has repeatedly delayed complying with the court’s order,” said Fairholme in the court documents. The judge gave the government until Nov. 1 to produce the documents. Freddie prices $217M K-deal. Freddie Mac priced a new offering of Structured Pass-Through Certificates (K Certificates) that are backed by underlying collateral consisting of supplemental multifamily mortgages. The company expects to issue approximately $217 million in K Certificates, which...

Nonbanks crossed a key threshold during 3Q16: Among the top 50 lenders, nonbanks accounted for 51.4 percent of 3Q originations – the first time these lenders grabbed more than half of the market…