For now, nonbanks that fund non-QMs must sell them to an investor unless they have a balance sheet. Securitizations likely won’t happen until sometime in 2015.
The Finance Agency filed suit against HSBC and 17 other firms in 2011. The two remaining defendants in the cases include Nomura Holdings and the Royal Bank of Scotland Group.
A number of firms that hold vintage non-agency mortgage-backed securities are using their clean-up call options as the outstanding balance in the MBS dwindles. Executing clean-up calls can be more profitable for certain firms than allowing securities to run-off. Chimera Investment is the latest firm to tout its clean-up call strategy. The real estate investment trust said it acquired the rights to $4.8 billion of seasoned subprime mortgages by purchasing subordinate tranches of non-agency MBS issued by Springleaf Finance between 2011 and 2013. The purchase price wasn’t disclosed.
The proposed ban is coming under heavy fire from different factions of the mortgage industry, including the Council of Federal Home Loan Banks, REITs and even private investors that own mortgage stocks.
The recent adoption by the Securities and Exchange Commission of its Regulation AB II disclosure rule is expected to be a “credit positive” for the auto loan and lease ABS sector, but it probably will also raise costs for market participants and, ultimately, consumers, according to an industry consensus of the new rule. The new regulatory regime mandates standardized loan-level disclosures for ABS backed by auto loans and leases, as well as other classes, as reported previously. The loan-level data have to be provided on the SEC’s free online database known as the EDGAR system. Although specific data requirements vary by asset class, the new asset-level disclosures generally will include...
Commercial banks and thrifts reported a modest decline in their non-mortgage ABS investments during the second quarter of 2014, although several key sectors showed growth, according to a new analysis and ranking by Inside MBS & ABS. Bank call reports show that the industry held $171.2 billion of non-mortgage ABS in portfolio as of the end of June. That was down 0.8 percent from March, marking the second straight quarterly decline after bank ABS holdings hit a record $173.8 billion at the end of 2013. Bank holdings of auto loan ABS actually increased...[Includes one data chart]
A former analyst at Moody’s Ratings has accused the credit rating agency of complicity in the financial meltdown in 2008, while a federal judge in Texas dismissed a government lawsuit against major banks involving non-agency MBS because it was filed too late. In his 2012 whistleblower lawsuit against Moody’s, Ilya Kolchinsky, a former analyst with the firm, alleged that the rating service issued inflated ratings, often “Aaa,” to most risky residential MBS and collateralized debt obligations it reviewed from 2004 to 2007. The lawsuit was brought...