Issuance of expanded-prime non-agency mortgage-backed securities is heating up with a new participant in the market and a quick second deal from Redwood Trust. Ellington Financial is preparing to issue its first non-agency MBS, which will largely consist of non-qualified mortgages originated by LendSure Mortgage. Morningstar Credit Ratings and S&P Global Ratings assigned preliminary AAA ratings to the deal this week. “Ellington Financial’s ability to access the robust securitization markets ...

Redwood Trust increased its acquisitions of jumbo mortgages in the third quarter, helped by strong demand for jumbo mortgage-backed securities. The real estate investment trust acquired jumbos with a total unpaid principal balance of $1.50 billion in the third quarter, up 25.0 percent from the previous period and up 15.4 percent a year ago. Officials said spread tightening helped the REIT compete with banks for jumbos. In the third quarter, Redwood closed two super-prime jumbo MBS with ...

Nonprime lenders allow credit scores as low as 500 and loan-to-value ratios up to 90.0 percent, but new originations don’t typically reach such extremes. According to an analysis by Inside Nonconforming Markets, the average credit score on loans in nonprime/Alt A mortgage-backed securities issued in recent years was 701.1. The average combined LTV ratio for the loans was 74.9 percent and the average debt-to-income ratio was 37.0 percent. The analysis ... [Includes one data chart]

Tax reform legislation from Republicans in Congress could have an outsized impact on borrowers who take out jumbo mortgages, according to industry analysts. The tax reform in the House detailed last week would reduce the amount of debt eligible for the mortgage interest deduction and would limit deductions of state income taxes and property taxes. For new home purchases, the revised MID would only apply up to $500,000 in debt, down from a current cap of $1.0 million ...

Originations of higher-priced mortgages increased significantly in 2016 compared with the previous year, according to an analysis by Inside Nonconforming Markets of data from the Home Mortgage Disclosure Act. The analysis excluded government-insured mortgages, multifamily loans and home-improvement loans. Some $28.61 billion of non-government-insured higher-priced mortgages were originated in 2016, up 28.9 percent from the previous year ... [Includes one data chart]

Freddie Mac significantly reduced its holdings of nonprime mortgage-backed securities in the third quarter, according to an analysis by Inside Nonconforming Markets. Freddie held $5.14 billion of nonprime MBS as of the end of September, down 52.2 percent from June. The government-sponsored enterprise sold approximately $5.00 billion of its non-agency MBS holdings during the quarter, according to filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission ... [Includes one data chart]

Correspondent-based lending operations are accounting for a growing share of the FHA and VA home loans pooled in Ginnie Mae mortgage-backed securities, according to a new analysis and ranking by Inside FHA/VA Lending. In fact, correspondent originations are the only production channel to see year-over-year growth in FHA and VA business through the first nine months of 2017. Retail and wholesale-broker production is down for both FHA and VA loans. Correspondent programs are most dominant in the FHA market, perhaps reflecting a preference among large producers to have recourse to a primary-market lender if the government later finds defects in how the loan was originated. Correspondents accounted for 48.7 percent of FHA loans pooled in Ginnie MBS during the first nine months of the year, up from 43.1 percent in all of 2016. Volume was up 1.7 percent from the ... [Charts]

A flurry of prime non-agency mortgage-backed securities priced in October with issuance from JPMorgan Chase, Flagstar Bank and American International Group totalling $2.13 billion. Chase brought a $911.1 million deal backed by a higher than usual share of mortgages eligible for sale to the government-sponsored enterprises. Some 46.7 percent of the dollar volume of loans backing JPMorgan Mortgage Trust 2017-4 was loans eligible for sale to Fannie Mae or Freddie Mac ...

Two regional banks posted varied results in terms of jumbo originations in the third quarter of 2017. Flagstar Bank boosted its production while First Republic Bank’s originations fell on a quarterly basis and were up compared with the third quarter of 2016. Flagstar had $2.90 billion in jumbo originations in the third quarter, a 31.8 percent increase from the previous quarter and up 61.1 percent from the third quarter of 2016. Officials at Flagstar noted that the bank’s jumbo originations were ...

Citadel Servicing Corp. continues to ready its first nonprime mortgage-backed security and received risk assessments from Morningstar Credit Ratings last week. The rating service evaluated Citadel as a lender and servicer, assigning it level-three rankings on a scale of one to four, with four being the worst. The assessment, along with a similar assessment by Fitch Ratings earlier this year, show that Citadel is taking steps toward issuing rated nonprime MBS. Sources close to ...