Credit card issuers will probably have a good 2018, much like they did last year, but some dark clouds are beginning to appear on the horizon, according to a new report from DBRS.

Ginnie Mae is expanding its guidelines to clarify the amount of risk it considers acceptable for an issuer’s Ginnie mortgage servicing rights portfolio and what could happen if the issuer violates those standards. The move is part of the agency’s continuous monitoring of issuer activity and MSR portfolios to ensure they are not putting issuers, investors or the program at risk.

Ginnie Mae is expanding its guidelines to clarify the amount of risk it considers acceptable for an issuer’s mortgage servicing rights portfolio and what administrative actions an issuer with excessive portfolio risk could face. The move is part of the agency’s continuous monitoring of issuer activity and MSR portfolios to ensure they are not putting issuers, investors or the program at risk. In its revised MBS Guide, Ginnie provides examples that fall outside of the acceptable risk parameters. Issuers deemed to carry excessive risk will find their participation in the MBS program greatly restricted, the agency warned. In addition, Ginnie may require offenders to recalibrate their high-risk portfolio to more acceptable risk levels, diversify their portfolio, or restrict their participation in Ginnie’s co-issue program, Pool Issues for Immediate Transfer (PIIT) and/or multiple pools. Ginnie is urging issuers to review the ...

President Trump this week signed a short-term spending bill that would keep the government operating until Feb. 8, 2018. The bill ended a three-day shutdown after the previous spending authority for most of the government expired at midnight on Jan. 19. However, the threat of another shutdown looms. FHA and Ginnie Mae both had contingency plans in place in case the short-lived shutdown dragged on, as it had in 2013. That event lasted for 16 days, at a loss of $1.6 billion a day to the federal government. Under FHA’s emergency plan, the agency would continue to endorse new single-family forward mortgages, but not Home Equity Conversion Mortgages and Title I loans. Ginnie would reduce staffing to essential personnel but continue its secondary market operations. It would continue to remit timely payment of principal and interest to investors, grant commitment authority and support issuance of ...

A record year in agency multifamily MBS issuance pushed the overall commercial mortgage securitization market to an all-time high in 2017, according to a new analysis by Inside MBS & ABS.

Losses on non-agency MBS backed by re-performing loans issued in recent years have been minimal, according to DBRS. Performance has been helped by home price appreciation, and the one deal to suffer significant losses was an outlier in terms of the types of loans it included.

The daily trading volume in agency MBS averaged $209.1 billion in 2017, the best showing in four years, according to the Securities Industry and Financial Markets Association.

Remarkably, Freddie Mac knocked out roughly $34.60 billion in multifamily MBS – over half of its total for the year – during the fourth quarter...

Statistical sampling, which gained widespread acceptance in MBS repurchase cases after the housing crisis, is being rejected in many courts today, legal experts say.

The year is still young, but two of the largest real estate investment trusts – Annaly Capital Management and New Residential Investment Corp. – have already priced stock deals totaling $852.5 million.