The Treasury Department is considering working with an issuer to sell a non-agency MBS that would serve as a benchmark transaction, according to agency officials. The goal of the issuance is to attract investors to the sector and create a standard term sheet for issuers. “The Treasury is thinking about facilitating one or more benchmark transactions,” Michael Stegman, counselor to the Treasury Department for housing finance policy, said this week at the ABS East conference produced by Information Management Network in Miami Beach. He said...

Investors are comfortable with broad swaths of the structured finance market and issuers are cautiously optimistic that regulators won’t hinder activity too much going forward, according to attendees at the ABS East conference produced by Information Management Network this week in Miami Beach. “We’re in a pretty good spot right now in the market from a supply-demand perspective,” said Bob Behal, a principal and co-head of ABS investments and commercial MBS investments at Vanguard Group. Almost 3,700 people had registered by the start of the conference, up slightly from around 3,500 people in 2013. Will Zak, a director at Barclays, said...

The rapid growth of nonbank special servicers since the mortgage crisis has resulted in a concentration of entities controlling the vast majority of loans in need of a work out, which could present some risks for non-agency MBS, according to a report by Fitch Ratings. Fitch cited industry consolidation, increased specialization and regulation as the primary drivers of the concentration shift toward nonbank servicers. “Historically, servicing was concentrated among the largest commercial banks due to their dominant market share in mortgage origination,” the rating service said. “Today, several nonbank servicers have achieved portfolio sizes that have begun to eclipse their banking counterparts.” Fitch noted...

A number of steps have been taken to reform the non-agency mortgage-backed security market but more changes are necessary, according to Michael Stegman, counselor on housing finance policy to the Treasury Department. Last week at a conference hosted by the Bipartisan Policy Center, Stegman detailed regulatory changes necessary to increase activity in the non-agency MBS market along with other changes the industry can work toward. “The last remaining piece of the puzzle is putting in place ...

JPMorgan Chase and Two Harbors Investment are preparing to issue two new jumbo mortgage-backed securities. The $483.56 million JPMorgan Mortgage Trust 2014-IVR3 is set to receive AAA ratings from DBRS and Kroll Bond Rating Agency. The deal includes a number of unique characteristics, including consisting solely of adjustable-rate mortgages and having representations and warranties that DBRS deemed as weak. The majority of the loans in Chase’s planned MBS are seven-year ARMs ...

Moody’s Investors Service is working on revamping its process for rating new non-agency mortgage-backed securities, including allowing issuers to use the same loan-level model used in Moody’s rating process. “We are providing an unprecedented level of transparency through publication of our model,” Navneet Agarwal, a managing director of residential MBS at Moody’s, said last week during a webinar hosted by the rating service. In August, Moody’s published a request for comment on its proposed ...

Some 64 percent of 884 community banks originating mortgages offer non-QMs, according to a survey conducted by the Conference of State Bank Supervisors. The results were published this week in a report from the Federal Reserve and the CSBS. Homewood Mortgage is the latest non-agency lender to announce a stated-income product. The program is available only for self-employed borrowers, with stringent requirements regarding liquidity and assets ... [Includes six briefs]

Efforts to reduce the government-sponsored enterprises’ footprint using guaranty fees and loan limits should be left to Congress, according to Bob Ryan, a special advisor to the director of the Federal Housing Finance Agency. Meanwhile, officials at the Treasury Department suggest that the FHFA does have a role in setting policy that will inform any housing finance reform action by Congress. In comments this week at the ABS East conference produced by Information Management Network in Miami Beach, Ryan said the FHFA looks to Congress for direction when considering how to run the conservatorship of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. “There is nothing in the legislation that suggests the FHFA should shrink the footprint [of the GSEs],” he said. Ryan said...

The supply of 1-4 family mortgage debt declined again in the second quarter of 2014 despite an uptick in whole loans held in bank, thrift and credit union portfolios, according to an Inside Mortgage Finance analysis. The Federal Reserve Board late last week reported $9.855 trillion in single-family mortgage debt outstanding at the end of June. That was down $4.9 billion from March – a scant 0.05 percent decline, but the second straight quarterly downturn. The increase in mortgage debt outstanding in the third quarter of 2013 increasingly looks like an aberration rather than a turning point. The most recent figure is...[Includes one data chart]

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...