Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac observers are scratching their heads about “minimum return on equity” requirements that the Federal Housing Finance Agency has imposed, somewhat mysteriously, on the two government-sponsored enterprises.
As predicted, per the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, the GSEs’ fourth-quarter earnings took a big hit with Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac posting losses of $6.5 billion and $2.9 billion, respectively. This is a far cry from their combined net income of $7.7 billion in the third quarter. But this likely one-time event was prompted by the GSEs having to reduce the value of their deferred tax assets by $15.3 billion after the tax act became law in December 2017. As a result, Fannie will need a $3.7 billion draw from Treasury and Freddie will have to request a $312 million draw.
This week, 127 mortgage banking executives attached their names to an open letter to members of Congress, urging federally elected politicians not to cede the work of housing-finance reform to the White House and the institutions it controls.The correspondence asks lawmakers to back draft legislation that creates a new “guarantor-based” system that builds on the current infrastructure created and maintained by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.The executives, members of the Mortgage Bankers Association, favor improving the system by having “two or more” guarantors. The group believes a guarantor-based system – as opposed to an “issuer-based” system – is the best way to meet the nation’s housing-finance needs.
The draft of the housing-finance reform proposal from Sen. Bob Corker, R-TN, appears to have morphed out of both the Mortgage Bankers Association plan and a proposal put forth by Michael Bright and Ed DeMarco. A recent analysis by the Structured Finance Industry Group compared the Senate discussion draft with the other two proposals. SFIG noted that all three proposals advocate an explicit mortgage-backed securities guarantee, preserving the to-be-announced market and the 30-year fixed-rate mortgage. But when it comes to the cash window, the Senate draft deviates from the MBA and Bright/DeMarco plans, which suggested maintaining the cash window operations through the GSEs. Corker’s draft would maintain the cash window through the guarantors
Small lenders and affordable housing groups are not fans of the draft of housing-finance reform from Sen. Bob Corker, R-TN. Corker’s plan calls for having five or more guarantors to promote competition in the marketplace, but some worry about the big banks becoming the primary benefactors of this plan.With several private companies purchasing and securitizing mortgages, advocates of the 80-page draft said it would help end the duopoly of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. The proposal includes winding down the GSEs to establish the new guarantors of which none would be able to control more than 20 to 25 percent of the market.
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