Federal Claims Court Judge Margaret Sweeney appears to be annoyed with the government’s executive privilege pleas and ordered the U.S. Treasury Department and Federal Housing Finance Agency to turn over another heap of documents in a prominent GSE shareholder case. Some see this as a possible legal coup for Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac shareholders in the Fairholme Funds Inc. v. United States, et al. net worth sweep case. The agencies have attempted to keep the documents, containing various memos, emails, presentations and other communications, tucked away under executive privilege. But last week, Sweeney, once again, made it mandatory that the government agencies produce more documents, close to 60 this time, for the plaintiff’s attorneys.
Several special interest groups are worried that the common securitization platform could become part of a backdoor effort to “piecemeal” GSE reform via possible provisions to transfer CSP control to the private sector. The Community Home Lenders Association, Community Mortgage Lenders of America, and six other trade and civil rights groups penned a letter to Congress last week urging the House to not adopt individual provisions as riders to an FY 2017 funding bill or other “must-pass” legislation that they say could bias the final outcomes of an ultimate comprehensive GSE reform bill. Provisions to transfer control of the CSP to the private sector, and most likely the largest private financial institutions have not...
Representatives from Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac discussed misperceptions about the common securitization platform and the goal of aligning policies of the two GSEs at last week’s ABS East conference in Miami. Mark Hanson, Freddie’s senior vice president of securitization, said the importance of the CSP is that it’s “shareable,” during one of the panel sessions.“That opens up a lot of thinking and potential for down the road. But in it being shareable there are some requirements that come with all that,” he said. Hanson added, “A lot of what’s required and a lot of what’s taken so much time in all this is to get alignment between Freddie and Fannie.
Documents obtained by Inside MBS & ABS reveal that Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac were required to charge the same “minimum” guaranty fee for single-family guaranty commitments issued on or after Aug. 1. Both government-sponsored enterprises received identical marching orders for minimum g-fees: 44 basis points for 30-year mortgages and 30 bps for 15-year loans. And, according to copies of emails from the Federal Housing Finance Agency following up on the agency’s initial July 29 directive, an unspecified number of Freddie sellers were paying less than the minimum. The names of these sellers were redacted...[Includes one data table]
Money market funds held some $114.16 billion of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac debt as of the end of August, a 3.0 percent increase from the end of last year, according to a new Inside MBS & ABS analysis of data compiled by the Office of Financial Research. But new regulations have spurred a migration from prime money market funds into government funds, said the OFR, a unit of the U.S. Department of Treasury. The shift from prime to government funds reflects new Securities and Exchange Commission rules aimed at making prime funds less vulnerable to investor runs, OFR analysts explained in a recent research brief. Although the new SEC requirements don’t become mandatory until Oct. 14, 2016, fund managers began...[Includes one data table]
The scratch-and-dent market for residential loans that have TRID-related errors is still alive and (mostly) well, even though originators have had almost a year to adjust to the new disclosure regime introduced by the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. “This market will never be exhausted,” said Jeff Bode, chairman and CEO of Mid America Mortgage, Addison, TX, one of the most active buyers of mortgages that have errors related to consumer disclosures tied to the Truth in Lending Act and the Real Estate Settlement Procedures Act. Of course, it’s...
Ginnie Mae issuers that use subservicers need to have a proper subservicing oversight plan that encompasses all aspects of their Ginnie servicing portfolio to avoid servicing mishaps and liability. Participants in a recent Ginnie Mae summit in Washington, DC, pooled their collective experiences with subservicers to come up with a general oversight plan touching on every servicing function. These functions include escrow, collections, customer service, notifications, loss mitigation, loan modification, payoff, claims and maintenance. The decision to use a subservicer is...
During the second quarter, Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac and the Veterans Affairs home loan guaranty program all saw significant increases in production of “agency jumbo” loans – mortgages with loan amounts exceeding the baseline $417,000 agency loan limit. A new Inside Mortgage Finance analysis reveals that the agencies’ combined jumbo production, including FHA activity, rose 53.3 percent to $36.2 billion during the second quarter. That represented the highest quarterly total since “emergency” high-cost loan limits were established in the aftermath of the financial crisis. The FHA had...[Includes three data tables]
In general, it hasn’t been a pretty picture this year when it comes to the sale of “bulk” mortgage servicing rights, especially Ginnie Mae receivables. According to figures compiled by affiliate publication Inside Mortgage Trends, bulk MSR transfers (one barometer of sales) increased 20.6 percent in the second quarter compared to the first with roughly $42.9 billion of Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac and Ginnie product changing hands. The third quarter is expected...
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