As of Monday morning, none of the parties involved – FHFA, the FHFA IG, and the Council – were commenting to IMFnews. Nor were they denying the existence of an investigation.
Capital Proposed Rule Comment Period Extended to November. The Federal Housing Finance Agency announced this week that it is extending the public comment period for the agency's proposed rule on Enterprise Capital Requirements by an additional 60 days. The previous deadline for comments was Sept. 17, 2018. The new deadline will be Nov. 16, 2018. FHFA extended the public comment period “due to the high level of interest in the proposed rule and requests from multiple stakeholders for more time to evaluate it.” GSE shareholders group Investors Unite, said, “However complex capital standards are, professionals who dwell in this policy area every day should be able to offer their views within a three-month window.”
The GSEs have recently updated their policies as they look to simplify borrower-initiated requests to cancel private mortgage insurance coverage. Fannie is the latest to announce plans to update the various methods it uses for verifying current property values and said it will require servicers to implement the new policy by March 1, 2019. Borrower-initiated requests to terminate mortgage insurance based on the home’s original value no longer need to depend on servicers to warrant the property value, under Fannie’s new policy. The GSE said lenders can use the GSE’s Automated Property Service tool to verify the current...
Multifamily purchase volume continued to surge for the GSEs in the second quarter. But as the mortgage giants maintain their large footprint in the multifamily market, some industry observers allege mission creep. During the second quarter, Fannie Mae provided $14.5 billion in multifamily financing, up from $11.3 billion in the first quarter of 2018. Freddie Mac also increased its volume in the second quarter and provided $15.8 billion in multifamily credit, up from $13.0 billion in the first quarter. Second-quarter numbers are a good indicator that even at the midway point in 2018, the GSEs are on track to meet or surpass last year’s financing volume.
As the financial markets begin transitioning from the London Interbank Offered Rate, which is set to go away in 2021, Fannie Mae became a pioneer in a replacement index by issuing Secured Overnight Financing Rate (SOFR) securities. The government-sponsored enterprise announced that the three-tranche $6 billion SOFR debt transaction was created to accelerate the development of the SOFR market. And Fannie encourages other issuers in debt markets to follow. The inaugural transaction garnered strong investor demand for the floating rate notes from a diverse investor base, according to Fannie.
A senior executive at Fannie Mae is involved in a conflict-of-interest administrative review pertaining to alternative credit scores, according to a Federal Housing Finance Agency Office of Inspector General management alert. The 15-page alert, published on July 26, is heavily redacted. It noted that an executive did not disclose “critical information” about potential conflicts of interest. The IG said the person failed to make a timely and complete disclosure about a potential conflict of interest and asked the FHFA to take appropriate disciplinary action. “FHFA’s decision whether to accept an alternative credit scoring model for the enterprises is a high-stakes decision, with long-term impact,” said the OIG.
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