In today’s dramatically changed mortgage lending and regulatory environment, lenders must aggressively manage their originator compensation structures if they want to guarantee their compliance with all applicable laws and regulations, according to a top industry consultant. The first step is “to eliminate all incentive arrangements that pay commissions or bonuses based on any of the terms or conditions of the loans such as interest rates, demand features, prepayment penalties or proxies for these loan terms,” said Henry Oehmann, national executive compensation services executive director for Grant Thornton. Lenders...

Ratings by DBRS of new non-agency mortgage-backed securities will include analysis of several factors at the metropolitan statistical area level. The new rating methodology and loss model were released last week without substantive changes from the proposal the rating service issued in October. “The experience of the last decade has made it apparent that it is not credible to consider loan performance without factoring in house prices and unemployment rates,” DBRS said. ...

Non-agency investors will not support new mortgage-backed securities until lenders and issuers establish stringent standards for originations and securitization, according to industry participants. “You’re going to need something to convince people – at least in the top tier – that their credit risk is pretty low,” David Lukach, a partner and head of the U.S. structured finance group at PricewaterhouseCoopers, said at a discussion hosted by the Securities Industry and Financial Markets Association last week. ...

Agency residential MBS production bounced higher again in October, but the latest refinance boom – if it even qualifies as one – is still well short of the last cyclical high in late 2010. A new Inside MBS & ABS ranking and analysis reveals that $103.03 billion of agency single-family MBS were issued last month, a 7.0 percent gain from September. And October marked the third straight monthly increase after the agency MBS market hit a 30-month low back in July. Production in October still trailed the levels generated in the first two months of 2011, when the previous refi boom was...(Includes one graph and one data chart)

The proposed bill that would increase standardization and uniformity in the mortgage securities market – without Fannie Mae or Freddie Mac – contains many worthy components, but it needs more details and further tweaking, according to industry experts testifying at a House Financial Services Subcommittee on Capital Markets and Government Sponsored Enterprises hearing this week. The Private Mortgage Market Investment Act, drafted by Subcommittee Chairman Scott Garrett, R-NJ, would create a heavily regulated mortgage-backed securities market made up solely of private entities that would function with no federal...

Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac and their federal conservator are trying to devise a new servicing compensation scheme without upsetting the to-be-announced agency MBS market that Wall Street dealers and Main Street mortgage lenders depend on. In a recent white paper outlining two alternatives for reforming servicing compensation so that more resources are available for distressed loans, the Federal Housing Finance Agency said “promoting continued liquidity” in the TBA market is one of its primary objectives. The agency also mused that a new servicer compensation system for the government-sponsored enterprises could...

With the non-agency MBS sector still languishing, it’s time to put the approximately $6.3 billion in unused purchasing power at the Public-Private Investment Program to use in a revamped iteration, according to analysts at Deutsche Bank. “The Public-Private Investment Program has been having a tough time in 2011 despite a remarkable initial success in facilitating price discovery and supporting market functioning in the residential MBS market,” said two Deutsche Bank analysts in a recent report. They note that all eight of the Public-Private Investment Funds suffered a declining internal...

Credit rating agencies appear to be more generous in rating structured finance products over other bond types because they tend to bring in more revenue, according to a recent study by academics. Researchers at Indiana University, American University and Rice University said that, contrary to assertions by the top credit rating agencies, asset classes are not equal when it comes to ratings. The study “Credit Ratings Across Asset Classes: A=A?” claims there is overwhelming evidence that structured products, such as MBS, receive significantly higher, more optimistic ratings than those assigned to bonds issued by...

Redwood Trust took a loss on the $375.2 million jumbo mortgage-backed security it issued at the end of September, officials at the real estate investment trust revealed this week. However, the company plans to issue another jumbo MBS within the next few months and anticipates turning a profit on its non-agency activity in the long-term. ...

Prospects for a return of elevated conforming loan limits remain unclear after the Senate approved a reinstatement provision in an appropriations bill in October. Most conservatives in the House remain strongly opposed to the reinstatement – which would likely delay the return of the non-agency market. More than 30 percent of members of the House support a temporary reinstatement of elevated conforming loan limits, according to a letter sent to House leaders this week. ...