Interim CEO Hugh Frater’s six-month odyssey at Fannie Mae just got longer last week when the board selected him to take the position permanently. His tenure became effective March 26, and he will remain on the board directors.

Fannie Mae last week announced it completed a multi-tranche credit-insurance-risk transfer transaction covering an astonishing $11.7 billion worth of multifamily loans held in portfolio.

There was a lot of kumbaya among industry experts last week during the Senate Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs’ two days of hearings on the housing-finance reform outlined last month by panel Chairman Mike Crapo, R-ID.

Last week, Joseph Otting, the then-acting director of the Federal Housing Finance Agency, set the GSE rumor mills churning when he told an audience at George Mason University Law School that the agency would finish work this summer on the final capital rule for Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.

Democrats have begun to respond to last week’s Trump administration memorandum, which directed the Secretary of the Treasury to coordinate with the Federal Housing Finance Agency and other executive branch departments to develop a plan to end the conservatorships of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.

Banks and thrifts racked up $571 billion of advances from the Federal Home Loan Bank system at the end of 2018, a 3.3% sequential gain but off 1.9% from a year ago, according to an analysis by Inside The GSEs. [Includes one data chart.]

In a straight, party-line vote, the Senate Thursday confirmed conservative economist Mark Calabria to be the next director of the Federal Housing Finance Agency.

Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac got proportionally more of their single-family business from large-volume sellers in the first quarter, although production was down sharply in every seller category. [Includes two data charts.]

New York-based real estate investment trust MFA Financial is working on two separate non-QM- related MBS deals that could come to market sometime this spring, according to officials familiar with the transactions.

Industry participants fleshed out details of a housing-finance reform outline at two days of Senate hearings this week. They were divided, though, on whether an overhaul of the government-sponsored enterprises is even necessary, let alone what type of reforms need to be completed.