Officials at the Securities and Exchange Commission and the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority met this week to consider increasing pricing transparency on fixed-income products, including publishing transaction information on private-placement ABS. Investors have called for greater pricing transparency on ABS issuance – private placements and SEC-registered deals – while issuers warn that such disclosures could increase costs or reduce their willingness to issue securities. In addition to meeting with the SEC, FINRA’s board of directors met...

A total of $47.13 billion of new non-mortgage ABS were issued during the first quarter of 2013, a solid 31.2 percent gain from the end of last year, according to a new Inside MBS & ABS analysis and ranking of issuers and underwriters. The fast start for 2013 ABS issuance was up 15.1 percent from the first three months of last year, although it came up short of three of the strongest quarters since the financial market meltdown in late 2008, including the second quarter of 2012. If new issuance can maintain its current pace for the rest of the year, 2013 could see the strongest ABS production volume since before the crash. The driver so far has been...[Includes two data charts]

Production of new non-agency MBS and non-mortgage ABS increased sharply in the first quarter of 2013, offsetting a slight decline in the agency MBS market. Total MBS and ABS issuance rose 2.9 percent from the fourth quarter of 2012 to $515.3 billion during the first three months of 2013, according to a new Inside MBS & ABS analysis and ranking. The first quarter of this year was up 19.7 percent from the same period in 2012, and it marked the strongest quarterly issuance since the third quarter of 2009. For a change, the increase did not come...[Includes two data charts]

Investors in ABS backed by private student loans strongly oppose proposals in Congress to change bankruptcy laws in an effort to help such borrowers. In a letter this week to members of Congress, the American Securitization Forum said the proposals would increase the cost of private student loans and harm the investments of those holding private student loan ABS.

Sallie Mae is set to issue the first ABS of the year backed by private student loans, a market that is expected to reach 2012 levels although student loans are drawing more scrutiny from the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. Sallie’s SLM Private Education Loan Trust 2013-A will have an initial pool balance of $1.31 billion and it’s expected to receive a AAA rating, based on a presale report from Standard & Poor’s. Some $27.1 billion in federally-backed and private student loan ABS was issued...

Commercial banks and savings institutions boosted their holdings of non-mortgage ABS to a record $164.5 billion as of the end of 2012, according to a new Inside MBS & ABS ranking and analysis based on call report data. That was up 3.1 percent in just three months and represented a 19.1 percent jump from the fourth quarter of 2011 – although some of that year-long gain reflected the fact that thrifts did not begin filling out call reports until last year. It’s still a significant increase...[Includes one data chart]

A record number of investors are participating in the vehicle ABS sector and competition is increasing among issuers, prompting issuance and pricing close to pre-crisis levels. However, there are concerns that the strong performance by recent vintages of vehicle ABS will not last as underwriting standards loosen. Robert McDonald, a vice president at Goldman Sachs, said a vehicle ABS with 40 investors was previously considered to be a broadly distributed transaction. He said recent deals have had 60 investors. “We’re at an all-time high in terms of the number of unique investors for a transaction,” McDonald said at the American Securitization Forum’s ASF 2013 conference. Some $61.00 billion in ABS backed...

Moody’s Investor Services ranked as the top rating service in non-mortgage ABS ratings during 2012, according to a new Inside MBS & ABS ranking. DBRS was the leader in rating non-agency MBS transactions last year. In a market that grew by 15.9 percent in 2012, Moody’s increased the volume of ABS deals it rated by just 6.9 percent over its activity back in 2011. Still, the company edged past Fitch Ratings with a 64.9 percent market share even though it mostly sat out the booming credit card sector. Moody’s had its highest penetration rates in business loan ABS and was well represented in student loan and vehicle finance securitizations. Fitch had...[Includes two data charts]

A major surge in the securitization of student loans helped push overall non-mortgage ABS issuance up 65.9 percent during the fourth quarter of 2012, according to a new Inside MBS & ABS ranking and analysis. Total non-mortgage ABS issuance climbed to $147.0 billion in 2012, up 15.9 percent from the previous year. It was the strongest market for ABS securitization since 2009, but still trailed the levels reached prior to the financial market collapse in 2008. ABS backed by retail vehicle financing were...[Includes two data charts]

Nationstar Mortgage this week priced $300 million of asset-backed notes in what the company called “the first ever” securitization of collateral backed by agency servicing advances, a sign that nonbanks are beginning to see more liquidity for mortgage servicing rights. The yield on the Nationstar paper is an attractive 1.46 percent. The term is three years. And in another development in the same market, Home Loan Servicing Solutions, which is affiliated with Ocwen Financial, has signaled...