Securitization was still the dominant method to fund new home mortgage production in 2014, but Wall Street got a run for its money from portfolio lenders. A new Inside MBS & ABS analysis reveals that 70.5 percent of residential mortgages originated last year were funneled into mortgage securities. That was down from 78.5 percent in 2013 and represented the lowest mortgage securitization rate since 2006. Delivering eligible loans into new Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac and Ginnie Mae securities is...[Includes one data chart]
Industry participants in the Treasury Market Practices Group raised questions about the tax consequences and other issues involved in the plan to develop a “single security” in a meeting with the Federal Housing Finance Agency last month. The recently released minutes of the meeting do not provide much detail. The FHFA representatives described in broad terms the project to create a fungible MBS that Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac would both issue in the to-be-announced market. In response, “Most TMPG members noted...
Cherry Hill Mortgage Investment Corp., which has 76 percent of its assets invested in MBS, plans to whittle that down a bit and make a major push into mortgage servicing rights. The question is: will other real estate investment trusts follow suit? One REIT executive, who spoke under the condition his name not be used, said...
Credit enhancement levels for commercial MBS increased in the last quarter of 2014, which could lead to higher credit-support requirements for 2015 CMBS deals, according to Fitch Ratings. “The rating agencies are increasing credit enhancements on each tier of the CMBS bonds being offered because the underwriting has become more aggressive or the collateral is weak,” said Stephen Renna, president and CEO of the CRE Financial Council (CREFC), an industry trade group. The requirement for more credit support on the conduit deals shows...
In 2018, the GSE capital buffer falls to zero dollars. Zilch. Nada. Hopefully by then, President Bush or President Clinton will have worked out a GSE reform deal with Congress…
Lenders and investors are getting more comfortable with loans that don’t meet the qualified-mortgage standard, according to industry participants. A non-agency mortgage-backed security backed primarily by non-QMs could be issued as soon as this year. Chris Haspel, a partner and head of capital markets at Fenway Summer, whose Ethos Lending is originating non-QMs, said the “fear level” among rating services and warehouse lenders regarding non-QMs has ...
Separate efforts by the Treasury Department and the Structured Finance Industry Group aimed at attracting investors to new non-agency mortgage-backed securities continue to progress, according to industry analysts. The Treasury is working to facilitate a benchmark non-agency MBS while SFIG continues to develop standards as part of Project RMBS 3.0. Eric Kaplan, a managing director at Shellpoint Partners and leader of Project RMBS 3.0, said ...
Potential investors in jumbo mortgage-backed securities continue to push issuers to make significant changes to the way the market operates. “How is this ever going to be a $300 billion market if everybody has to look at reps and warrants on a deal-by-deal basis?” said Allan Berliant, a portfolio manager at Grantham Mayo Van Otterloo. “There needs to be a streamlined industry standard.” Berliant and many others called for changes at the ABS Vegas conference ...
With new consumer disclosures from the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau set to take effect in August and lenders still grappling with the ability-to-repay rule, due diligence is likely to continue to be a high priority for loans included in jumbo mortgage-backed securities, according to industry participants. Only a handful of jumbo MBS issued in recent years have included third-party due diligence for fewer than 100 percent of the loans. Issuers have been ...