Mary Jo White, chair of the Securities and Exchange Commission, stressed this week that the regulator plans to increase its enforcement activity, including more emphasis on trials. However, she said the SEC needs more appropriations from Congress to accomplish its goals. “We can’t judge at this point how many additional trials we’re going to have, but we already don’t have enough,” White said at a hearing this week by the Senate Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs. President Obama’s proposed...

After the dust-up in the capital markets from the last meeting of the Federal Reserve’s Open Market Committee over when the central bank will begin to “taper” its huge asset purchase program, this week’s meeting of the FOMC provided no new clues about the timing of the Fed’s exit strategy. “To support a stronger economic recovery and to help ensure that inflation, over time, is at the rate most consistent with its dual mandate, the committee decided to continue purchasing additional agency MBS at a pace of $40 billion per month and longer-term Treasury securities at a pace of $45 billion per month,” the FOMC said, reiterating previous announcements. Also, the FOMC is...[Includes one data chart]

Despite the best efforts of supporters, including a renewed public showing of support from the White House, a new push to enhance the Home Affordable Refinance Program through legislation will go nowhere fast, say industry observers. Introduced by Sen. Jeff Merkley, D-OR, the Rebuilding Equity Act, S. 1373, would modify HARP to cover $1,000 in closing costs for underwater borrowers who choose loan terms of 20 years or less to rebuild equity in their homes. “Both [the Congressional Budget Office] and Fannie Mae have estimated that this bill would have no net cost, because it would reduce the severity of financial loss when defaults do occur,” said Merkley. The bill would require...

Bank of New York Mellon has come under scrutiny for its actions in the proposed $8.5 billion settlement involving Bank of America and investors in 530 non-agency MBS issued by Countrywide Financial. A trial to approve the settlement regarding repurchase requests started in June and is on a break until early September. While the proposed settlement involves a payout from BofA, which acquired Countrywide, the settlement is an agreement between BNYM and 22 institutional investors represented by the law firm of Gibbs & Bruns. The agreement was reached under Article 77 which allowed BofA to have the settlement apply to all investors in the Countrywide securities in question. “I can honestly say...

Securitization of income-property mortgages declined by 7.9 percent during the second quarter of 2013, with the biggest drop coming in non-agency commercial MBS issuance, according to a new market analysis by Inside MBS & ABS. A total of $43.92 billion of commercial mortgage securities were issued during the second quarter, which still ranked as the second strongest quarter since the third quarter of 2007. For the first six months of 2013, total commercial mortgage securitization was up 78.5 percent from the same period, and the market appears likely to set another post-crash record by the time the year is over. The non-agency CMBS market has seen...[Includes one data chart]

The Securities and Exchange Commission prevailed Thursday in its case against Fabrice Tourre, a former vice president at Goldman Sachs. The regulator also plans to increase enforcement against Wall Street...

After roiling markets with unclear signals about when it will begin to taper asset purchases, the Federal Reserve returned to boilerplate guidance.

Mortgage real estate investment trusts can draw some guidance from a recent private-letter ruling from the Internal Revenue Service on whether excess spread on mortgage servicing rights can be deemed as real-estate assets for REIT purposes. According to a recently released IRS private-letter ruling dated April 12, certain excess servicing rights would constitute a real-estate asset, and income from the spread would be treated as interest on obligations secured by mortgages on real property, for purposes of tax rules governing REITs. MSRs generally represent...

Credit Suisse issued a non-agency jumbo MBS with loans seasoned an average of three months that had interest rates well below current rates.

New Penn Financial is one of the few lenders putting an emphasis on mortgages for borrowers that are foreign nationals. The company offers mortgages to non-U.S. citizens with rates and terms somewhat looser than those offered by other lenders operating in the niche market. “Our proprietary program offers flexibility and fewer restrictions,” New Penn said. While data on mortgages to foreign national borrowers are scarce, the loans largely appear to be a non-agency product, both held in portfolio and sometimes securitized ...