Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac continued to whittle away at their retained mortgage portfolios during the second quarter, keeping up a focus on shedding less-liquid assets. The two government-sponsored enterprises held a combined $637.0 billion of mortgage loans and mortgage securities at June 30, down 17.6 percent from a year ago. Under the current terms of their conservatorship, Fannie and Freddie are required to reduce their mortgage portfolios by at least 15.0 percent a year. By the beginning of 2018, each GSE portfolio is expected...[Includes one data table]

Fannie Mae’s new securitization program for modified single-family mortgages could generate as much as $24 billion in issuance, according to an analysis by Bank of America Merrill Lynch. The program will create “an asset class meriting investor focus,” BAML noted. Fannie recently released...

Federal banking regulators should make a number of adjustments to proposed net stable funding ratio requirements, according to the Structured Finance Industry Group and other industry participants. The Federal Deposit Insurance Corp., the Federal Reserve and the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency issued the NSFR proposed rule in April, following standards set by the Basel Committee on Banking Supervision. Comments on the proposed rule were due late last week. The NSFR addresses...

JPMorgan Chase is a step closer to settling a dispute with Deutsche Bank and the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. over certain mortgage securitization agreements in connection with the government’s takeover of failed mortgage lender Washington Mutual. According to Chase’s most recent 10-Q filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission, the firm, Deutsche Bank and the FDIC have signed a term sheet to resolve pending litigation brought by the German bank against Chase and the FDIC in relation to WaMu as well as Chase’s outstanding indemnification claims pursuant to the terms of the purchase-and-assumption agreement with the FDIC. The term sheet is subject...

Although delinquencies on commercial MBS rose for a fifth straight month during July, predictions of a bust have not developed and many analysts are starting to feel more comfortable with the sector, especially in regard to multifamily credits. According to figures compiled by Trepp, the overall delinquency rate on U.S. CMBS increased 16 basis points during the month to 4.76 percent. The percentage of loans considered seriously delinquent increased 19 bps to 4.67 percent. This compares...

A federal judge rejected efforts by the government to keep a new batch of official memos and other documents from being disclosed in the ongoing legal war over the terms of the conservatorships of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. U.S. Court of Federal Claims Judge Margaret Sweeney released a new set of documents that included a brief excerpt of former White House housing policy expert Jim Parrott’s deposition from January, a presentation from the Federal Housing Finance Agency in 2008 and several memos dating back to 2008 and 2012. Sweeney rejected...

Two Harbors Investment and other nonbank conduits exited the jumbo market just before pricing for new jumbo mortgage-backed securities improved, according to industry participants. “The difference between a bulk sale execution and a Sequoia execution right now is only an eighth of a point,” Marty Hughes, CEO of Redwood Trust, said this week during the real estate investment trust’s earnings call. “That’s the tightest it’s probably been in a year and a half.” Christopher Abate, Redwood’s ...

Two Harbors Investment more than doubled its jumbo mortgage-backed security issuance in 2015 compared with the previous year, but the increase wasn’t enough to make it worthwhile for the real estate investment trust to continue operating a mortgage conduit. “As we look forward, the environment just was not one that was conducive to the continuation of the business,” Thomas Siering, Two Harbors’ president and CEO, said last week during the REIT’s earnings call. “The market ...

The proposed rule from the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau addressing the TILA-RESPA Integrated Disclosure rule will likely help the non-agency market, according to industry participants. However, there’s also some frustration that the CFPB didn’t do as much as it could have to address cures and assignee liability. Industry attorneys note that if enough comments are submitted on the issues, the CFPB might make further changes to TRID. The changes proposed by the CFPB ...

Many servicers increased their jumbo portfolios during the second quarter, including both banks and nonbanks, according to a new ranking and analysis by Inside Nonconforming Markets. A group of 30 servicers handled an estimated $863.40 billion in jumbo mortgages as of the end of June, up 2.0 percent from the previous quarter and up 10.7 percent from the same time last year. Wells Fargo, the top jumbo lender, is also the largest jumbo servicer ... [Includes one data chart]