In the last quarter, for instance, Fannie and Freddie posted combined net earnings of $5.1 billion – most of which was swept into a Treasury account.

On a year-to-date basis, mortgage sales were down 63.6 percent from the first half of 2013.

In short, investors – if they bought mortgage stocks at their peaks – are looking at substantial losses...

Bob Behal, a principal and co-head of ABS and commercial MBS investments at Vanguard Group, said liquidity in the market is fair.

Why short Altisource? This source reasons that as real estate values continue to improve and foreclosures slow, Altisource will have less to do going forward...

SIFMA did not take a stance on whether g-fees should be adjusted up or down. Instead, the trade group stressed that it is unclear how a change to g-fees would impact non-agency activity.

The Federal Reserve’s Open Market Committee this week met Wall Street’s expectations that it will continue to plow principal payments from its holdings of agency MBS back into agency MBS until sometime after the central bank decides to raise its federal funds target range. “The timing will depend on how economic and financial conditions and the economic outlook evolve,” said the FOMC after its two-day meeting concluded Wednesday afternoon. In the meantime, the Fed’s tapering of its quantitative easing program will continue...

The non-agency MBS market remains stuck in the post-crisis doldrums, showing no signs of recovering, according to experts participating at this week’s Bipartisan Policy Center’s Housing Summit in Washington, DC. Efforts to ignite the growth in non-agency securitization channels to help reduce the government’s role in housing finance and draw back private capital have produced little result. Except for sporadic twitches, thanks to a smattering of deals backed by jumbo loans, the non-agency MBS market is barely alive, panelists said. The government, which is working to revive the non-agency market, sees...

Although investors continue to pay premium – or close to it – prices for newly originated mortgage servicing rights, very few residential lenders have tried to securitize the underlying cash flows, leaving some market observers scratching their heads. “There are very few deals out there that I’m aware of,” said one servicing advisor, requesting his name not be used. “If a company needs cash, it’s a good option, but there’s just not much going on.” So far this year, just a handful of MSR-backed bonds have come...

Fitch Ratings this week proposed changes in how it models home prices for loans to be included in new non-agency MBS. The change means more regions being classified as having sustainable home prices, which could lead to lower credit enhancement requirements on new securities. “The updated Sustainable Home Price model shows a stronger relationship to historical home prices and effectively distinguishes between periods of sustainable and unsustainable home prices,” the rating service said. “Under the new methodology, Fitch’s estimation of overvaluation is typically lower than in the previous model build.” Fitch has incorporated...