Despite the sequential jump in buybacks, the fourth quarter total was the second-lowest repurchase amount disclosed by the two...

Will Ocwen Financial get compensated for the termination?

Bank demand for MBS has increased due to new accounting requirements and a decline in total residential loan production in recent years.

The captive insurer is owned by a REIT, a spokeswoman for the district bank said, but declined to name either.

The biggest component in the aggregate portfolio was consumer ABS, which includes student loans, securitized leases and consumer debt other than credit cards, home-equity loans and auto finance...

Over the past few years, 482 of Ocwen’s deals have experienced breaches, but the trustee generally did not seek termination of the servicing contract.

Commercial banks and thrifts reported another decline in their ABS holdings during the fourth quarter of 2014, according to a new Inside MBS & ABS analysis of call-report data. In aggregate, banks and thrifts held $159.22 billion of ABS in their held-to-maturity and available-for-sale retained portfolios as of the end of last year. That was the industry’s lowest level of ABS investment since the middle of 2012, and it represented a 3.1 percent drop from a revised third-quarter total of $164.35 billion. The biggest component in the aggregate portfolio was...[Includes two data charts]

The dispute around an $8.5 billion settlement between Bank of America and non-agency MBS investors may be at an end after a New York state appeals court signed off on the deal. The agreement would mean a quick end to a lengthy legal battle over a settlement that was first announced on June 28, 2011. It also means the agreement could become the template for all representations-and-warranties settlements with large institutional investors, analysts said. BofA agreed...

Over a fifth of the loans securitized last year by Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac and Ginnie Mae do not meet one of the key criteria of the qualified-mortgage standard that came into effect in January 2014, and instead rely on an exemption for agency loans. During 2014, the three agencies securitized $198.3 billion of home loans with debt-to-income ratios exceeding 43.0 percent, according to a new Inside MBS & ABS analysis of loan-level disclosure data. That represented 21.5 percent of total MBS issuance by Ginnie and the two government-sponsored enterprises. The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau requires...

Officials from the Federal Housing Finance Agency as well as the government-sponsored enterprises will give an update on the common securitization platform project at an upcoming technology show – but don’t expect a “beta” test, at least not yet. Over the past two weeks, Inside MBS & ABS had been hearing reports that a private “demo” of the CSP was in the works – and might possibly happen at a technology show later this month in Orlando, sponsored by the Mortgage Bankers Association. FHFA principal strategist Michael Aneiro is scheduled...