The Federal Housing Finance Agency said last week to expect further litigation in its ongoing efforts to recover losses suffered by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac in connection to the two GSEs’ investments in non-agency securities.Last week, the Finance Agency filed suit against UBS Americas Inc. and various related entities alleging misstatements and omissions of non-agency MBS purchased by Fannie and Freddie.

The House Financial Services Committee’s second highest ranking Democrat is again facing ethics charges stemming from actions she allegedly took to aid a minority bank connected to her husband to recover losses it suffered when Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac preferred stock plummeted after the GSEs were put into conservatorship.The House Ethics Committee announced two weeks ago it will restart its investigation of ethics charges against Rep. Maxine Waters, D-CA, with the hiring of Washington, DC, attorney Billy Martin as an outside counsel to the committee to “review, revise and assist the committee in completing the matter.”

The private mortgage insurance industry is trying to preserve its viability in the mortgage world that has thrashed its financial health, urging regulators to expand the definition of a qualified residential mortgage to include loans that are privately insured. According to an analysis done by Milliman, Inc., an actuarial and insurance consulting firm, on behalf of the Mortgage Insurance Companies of America, private MI is a controlling factor that mitigates the risk of default, particularly in ...

Four of the top five mortgage servicers continued to gradually pare down their portfolios during the second quarter of 2011, while Wells Fargo inched further toward the top of the industry, according to a new ranking and analysis by Inside Mortgage Finance. Absent any blockbuster mergers or servicing acquisitions over the past few years, the major trend in the servicing business has been the winding down of distressed subprime and Alt A portfolios. Bank of America, still the largest servicer in the industry, has seen its portfolio shrink steadily since ... [includes one data chart]

Community bankers are lobbying for an exemption from national mortgage servicing standards that are evolving from federal rule-makers and secondary-market investors, arguing that they could drive smaller companies out of the servicing business. Jack Hopkins, CEO of CorTrust Bank in Sioux Falls, SD, urged the Senate Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs Committee this week to exempt small banks from new guidelines being drafted by banking and consumer protection regulators. Representing the Independent Community Bankers of America, Hopkins said the increased attention on mortgage servicing is raising ...

A number of distressed mortgage insurance companies with special covenants with state regulators and the government-sponsored enterprises are in danger of losing their ability to write new insurance as continued losses prevent them from meeting financial eligibility requirements. With credit trends further weakening in the second quarter, certain mortgage insurers, including Mortgage Guaranty Insurance Corp. and PMI Mortgage Insurance Co., could slip below minimum re-serve and surplus requirements, observers say. Already on capital-requirement waivers, the MIs could be ordered to stop ...

While many commenters support the proposed exemption for the government-sponsored enterprises from new risk-retention rules in the short-term, opinions vary as to just how long Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac should enjoy such an exemption and its long-term impact on private securitizations. Federal regulators earlier this year proposed a rule which would require issuers of mortgage-backed securities to hold a minimum 5 percent of the credit risk of the assets underlying their securities unless the deal is backed by “qualified residential mortgages.” The proposed rule would exempt ...

Faced with the daunting task of identifying $1.5 trillion in budget savings, lawmakers on Capitol Hill are likely to take a close look at sacred cows like the home mortgage interest tax deduction. The mortgage interest deduction is projected to cost the U.S. just shy of $100 billion this year, does little to incentivize buying homes and is in need of reform, according to experts on a panel sponsored by the Urban Institute and Brookings Institution. “The mortgage interest reduction is one of the very, very biggest and certainly the most ...

Wells Fargo and Bank of America continued to pull ahead of the field, adding Ginnie Mae servicing to their portfolios faster than the overall market grew during the second quarter of 2011. A new Inside Mortgage Finance analysis found the two companies holding 54.9 percent of Ginnie servicing outstanding at the end of June. Third-place JPMorgan Chase trailed overall growth in the market, while CitiMortgage and PNC Bank actually [includes one data chart]