With domestic economic growth stagnating in the first quarter as consumer debt levels continue to climb, the Federal Reserve Open Market Committee this week opted to leave interest rates unchanged and to maintain the status quo when it comes to its agency MBS investment strategy. The Bureau of Economic Analysis put the rate of growth in gross domestic product at 0.7 percent, versus the 2.1 percent growth seen in the fourth quarter of 2016, suggesting that the economic recovery from the Great Recession may be getting long in the tooth. At the same time, on the consumer front, a new study from Northwestern Mutual found...

Risk-retention requirements for MBS and ABS have been in effect for over a year, but industry participants are still grappling with how to comply with the standards, according to industry attorneys. Angela Ulum, a partner at the law firm of Mayer Brown, said industry practices and interpretations of the risk-retention requirements are starting to differ among different asset classes. During a webinar hosted by Mayer Brown last week, Ulum noted...

Fannie Mae late last month loosened its underwriting guidelines for borrowers with student loan and other types of debt, and is currently working on pilot programs aimed at helping consumers amass a downpayment. In an interview with Inside MBS & ABS this week, Fannie Vice President of Product Development and Affordable Housing Jonathan Lawless said the government-sponsored enterprise has “more to come” on loosening guidelines. Although he could not provide much in the way of detail, he said...

Officials at Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac and their regulator are encouraged by – but by no means satisfied with – the progress made by the government-sponsored enterprises and their customers at expanding the credit box. “We do see an expansion of credit, steady growth in the 97 percent [loan to value ratio] programs and a little better distribution of credit scores,” said Bob Ryan, special advisor and acting deputy director at the Federal Housing Finance Agency during remarks at the secondary market conference sponsored by the Mortgage Bankers Association in New York this week. “But they are still skewed to the higher end more than in the past.” Fannie and Freddie are trying...

Total issuance of agency single-family MBS rose a scant 0.6 percent from March to April, according to a new Inside MBS & ABS analysis and ranking. All of the increase came from Ginnie Mae issuance, which rose 16.1 percent from March, hitting $36.30 billion in April. Things were different for the two government-sponsored enterprises: Fannie Mae saw a 3.4 percent decline from the previous month and Freddie Mac volume was down 13.0 percent. Ginnie fared...[Includes two data tables]

Purchase loans accounted for 57.9 percent of April issuance for all three agencies, the highest penetration since September 2015…

Mark Filler, CEO of “fix and flip” lender Finance of America Commercial, Chicago, has parted ways with the company two months after its parent company bought his firm, Jordan Capital, and merged it with another lender in the space. According to sources close to Filler, his departure came as a surprise. When the deal was first struck in February, Filler was put in charge of FOAC, which combined Jordan with B2R Finance. When the merger was announced, Filler looked...

The two top executives at Impac Mortgage Holdings took home a combined $13.22 million in pay last year...

Congress should consider comprehensive reform in six areas to improve the solvency of the National Flood Insurance Program and improve resilience to flooding, according to a new report from the Government Accountability Office. The report comes in the wake of bipartisan legislation introduced last week in the Senate to reauthorize the NFIP and to broaden participation of private insurance in the flood insurance market. The program’s current authorization will expire in September this year. The GAO recommended...

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau last week warned that a large downpayment alone is not enough to prove the ability to repay a non-qualified mortgage when the loan was underwritten based on the consumer’s assets. “As an initial matter, a downpayment cannot be treated as an asset for purposes of considering the consumer’s income or assets under the ATR rule,” said the CFPB. “The ATR rule requires creditors to consider a consumer’s reasonably expected income or assets, ‘other than the value of the dwelling, including any real property attached to the dwelling that secures the loan.’” Further, while the size of a downpayment generally affects the loan amount, the ATR rule already accounts...