Ginnie Mae this week acted quickly to dispel rumors of a plan to sunset the agency’s single-issuer MBS program, saying the report was nothing but unwarranted speculation. Agency officials assured participants during a Ginnie issuer and investor symposium in Austin, TX, earlier this month that the reports were untrue. The false buzz spooked the markets early this week, causing price spreads between Ginnie Mae I and II programs to narrow, officials acknowledged. In an Oct. 7 memo to program participants, Ginnie Mae clarified...
It’s not every day that a stock comes public at $20 a share, falls 7 percent on its first day of trading and then continues to drift downward. Then again, if that stock is a mortgage investing real estate investment trust like Cherry Hill Mortgage Investment Corp., it’s no big surprise. Thanks to rising interest rates – which actually have been in decline during the government shutdown and uncertainty over the U.S. debt ceiling – mortgage REITs have been battered in the market. Cherry Hill, a spin-off of Freedom Mortgage of Mt. Laurel, NJ, went...
Investors at the ABS East conference in Miami this week had a positive outlook for most structured finance investment options, such as vintage non-agency MBS, auto and credit card ABS, collateralized loan obligations and esoteric assets. They were less bullish about new jumbo MBS. More than 3,500 people registered for the conference this year including more than 1,000 investors. Jade Friedensohn, a senior vice president at Information Management Network, the event sponsor, said it was the biggest turnout for ABS East since before the financial crisis. “In the short term things are...
Officials at Fannie Mae said they learned from Freddie Mac when structuring their pending risk-sharing transaction, including getting the deal rated. Investors are generally impressed with the transactions and look forward to more. Fannie’s Connecticut Avenue Securities Series 2013-C01 is scheduled to close on Oct. 24, according to a presale report released late last week by Fitch Ratings. The higher of the two tranches offered for sale is set to receive a BBB- rating, the lowest investment grade rating available. Speaking at the ABS East conference produced by Information Management Network this week in Miami, Laurel Davis, a vice president at Fannie Mae, said...
Seven different issuers generated a relatively strong $3.94 billion in jumbo non-agency MBS during the third quarter, but the sector’s resurgence in 2013 seemed to be losing steam and faces an uncertain future. Jumbo MBS issuance declined 9.1 percent from the second quarter and one transaction – Shellpoint’s second of the year – was pulled back as September came to a close. Redwood Trust managed $1.18 billion in new issuance, a 34.1 percent drop from the second quarter, while the two other jumbo veterans, Credit Suisse and JPMorgan Chase, saw reduced production as well. Industry participants are divided...[Includes three data charts]
The Department of Justice recently announced settlements from three fair lending actions, all of which included allegations related to wholesale mortgage lending operations. In the first case, Southport Bank of Kenosha, WI, agreed to pay $687,000 to African-American and Hispanic wholesale mortgage borrowers as part of a settlement to resolve allegations that it engaged in a pattern or practice of discrimination on the basis of race and national origin. The proceeds of the settlement will be used...
The Mortgage Bankers Association last week won affirmation of its July victory over the Department of Labor in the trade group’s appeal of a government policy that declared mortgage loan officers did not qualify under the administrative exemption to overtime pay. On Oct. 2, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia refused to grant a full-court review of its decision exactly three months earlier that sided with the MBA on how the DOL imposed overtime compensation requirements under the Fair Labor Standards Act. The MBA filed...
Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac plan to test parts of a common securitization platform under development by year-end, according to an official at the Federal Housing Finance Agency. The FHFA separately announced this week what it deemed to be “significant steps” for the government-sponsored enterprises’ planned CSP. A year-and-a-half after the federal regulator announced the project, the platform remains a nebulous goal that GSE officials hope to make exceedingly encompassing and flexible. Speaking this week at the ABS East conference in Miami sponsored by Information Management Network, Wanda de Leo, deputy director of the FHFA’s office of strategic initiatives, said...
The Obama administration is working to reform the government-sponsored enterprises but has said little publicly about its efforts for political reasons, according to a former advisor for the administration. As for when Congress might pass GSE reform, predictions range from as soon as next year to sometime after Obama’s presidency, if at all. Speaking at the ABS East conference sponsored by Information Management Network this week in Miami, Jim Parrott, owner of Falling Creek Advisors and a senior advisor at the National Economic Council until earlier this year, said the Obama administration has largely avoided publicly pushing GSE reform since releasing a white paper on the issue in 2011 due to concerns about reactions from Republicans in Congress. “The administration has been quite involved...
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