The Mortgage Bankers hailed the bill for supporting a number of MBA priorities and for rejecting an administration proposal to fund FHA technology upgrades through a fee on lenders.

The delinquency rate declined by 8.4 percent in March compared with February and was down 12.4 percent on an annual basis.

“Investors are taking the conservative approach,” said the Morrison & Foerster attorney. “No one wants to be the test case. They’re all worried about what a court might say.”

Roughly $41.42 billion of non-mortgage ABS were issued in the first quarter, up 35.8 percent from the unusually low volume at the end of 2015.

Altavera chief Brian Simons said staffing requests suggest the industry is preparing for an increase in non-QM business.

The average daily trading volume in agency MBS fell to $189.4 billion in March, the lowest reading of the year, and a sign that liquidity may still be an issue, depending on which seat you’re in. According to figures compiled by the Securities Industry and Financial Markets Association, the trading numbers for 2016, so far, haven’t exactly lit the world on fire. In January and February, the readings were $195.1 billion and $201.4 billion, respectively. Last year, the best reading was...

Ginnie Mae is shutting down its long-running Targeted Lending Initiative (TLI) because it has not made much of an impact on lending to underserved urban and rural areas in recent years. Launched in 1997, the TLI was designed to encourage lenders to finance housing in underserved areas through a reduced guaranty fee. In 2005, the program played a major role in offering relief and financial assistance to homeowners in areas hardest hit by Hurricane Katrina. Under the TLI, Ginnie Mae’s guaranty fee is reduced...

Pingora Asset Management, one of the largest investors in “flow” mortgage servicing rights arrangements, is about to become the property of the nation’s largest real estate investment trust focused on the MBS market, Annaly Capital Management, New York. The purchase of Pingora’s parent, Hatteras Financial, Winston-Salem, NC – a deal valued at $1.5 billion – was unveiled last week, but one important facet regarding Hatteras garnered little in the way of press attention: that it just happens to own Pingora, which at last check laid claim to roughly $76 billion in MSR assets. However, not all of the servicing rights will become...

The chairman of the Senate Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs signaled this week that Congress is unlikely to take up comprehensive legislation to reform the government-sponsored enterprises before the presidential election this fall. Committee Chairman Richard Shelby, R-AL, asked the Government Accountability Office to publish a report on a variety of issues involving the GSEs and their potential future structure by Nov. 1. Shelby’s deadline could be ambitious for such a complex issue: a report published last week by the GAO on issues with nonbank mortgage servicers was requested back in October 2014. The timeline suggests...

Two years after the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau’s ability-to-repay (ATR) rule went into effect, residential mortgage servicers have yet to see borrower claims being brought, according to a new report from Fitch Ratings. However, Fitch says the landscape could change as certain non-qualified mortgage loans become more common. But for now, the lack of borrower claims is not surprising, the report said. Most loans, including those eligible for purchase by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, meet...