Whatever happened to the sale of Cole Taylor Mortgage, which has been in the works for nine months or so? Good question. When we asked one source close to the deal, his response was this: “Think of the Energizer Bunny but with fairly old batteries.

Some banks and thrifts have been able to originate enough new mortgages to replace runoff from their portfolios, but the industry’s retained holdings of first-lien mortgages continued to decline in the fourth quarter of 2013, according to a new ranking and analysis by Inside Nonconforming Markets. Banks and thrifts held a total of $1.74 trillion in first-lien mortgages as of the end of 2013, down only 3.0 percent compared with the end of 2012 ... [Includes one data chart]

Lowering Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac loan limits is one of the easiest levers the federal government could pull to increase non-agency participation in the mortgage market but most market participants favor keeping them at their current levels. In December, the Federal Housing Finance Agency announced that it was considering reducing the loan “purchase limits” for the government-sponsored enterprises. Under the plan, the GSEs could not purchase loans exceeding ...

In the end, it's all about yield, which is why investors are going after "esoteric" ABS. Will non-prime MBS ever stage a comeback, even a mini-comeback?

The serious delinquency rate on servicer portfolios hasn’t improved much in the past year, from 5.7 percent in the fourth quarter of 2012 to 5.4 percent in the fourth quarter of 2013.

With just one accord this week, the Federal Housing Finance Agency more than doubled the amount it has recovered on behalf of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac from issuers and underwriters that sold subprime and Alt A MBS to the government-sponsored enterprises. Bank of America agreed to a $9.3 billion settlement that covers its own dealings as well as those of Countrywide Financial and Merrill Lynch, which it acquired in 2008. The agreement covers some $57 billion of MBS issued or underwritten by these firms. BofA did not admit...[Includes one data chart]

Fannie Mae this week released its STAR servicer rankings and hopefully a copy found its way to all those pesky regulators who think nonbank servicers can’t tell the difference between a debit and a credit.

If all goes as scheduled, the most prolific issuer of jumbo mortgage-backed securities since 2010 won’t issue a jumbo MBS in the first quarter of 2014, the first quarterly blank for the firm since the end of 2011. Redwood is planning to issue a $347.30 million jumbo MBS on April 2; the deal priced this week. It’s the first jumbo MBS from the real estate investment trust since November. Officials at Redwood said a lack of demand from investors has limited issuance of jumbo MBS ...

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau’s ability-to-repay requirements and standards for qualified mortgages will prompt greater rating-service scrutiny of lenders that participate in the non-agency mortgage-backed security market. Fitch Ratings noted last week that its new criteria for non-agency MBS with mortgages that have loan applications that were received on or after Jan. 10 will require additional analysis, including an expanded review of underwriting processes ...

Bipartisan mortgage-reform legislation under consideration in the Senate could open significant opportunities for firms currently involved in the non-agency market, according to industry analysts. Firms with jumbo conduit operations and real estate investment trusts that invest in non-agency mortgage-backed securities could see their potential markets increase significantly under the proposed system. Sens. Tim Johnson, D-SD, and Mike Crapo, R-ID, have proposed a ...