The top three rating services continued to dominate the new issuance market in non-mortgage ABS during the first nine months of 2012, according to a new Inside MBS & ABS analysis, but the biggest player in the non-agency MBS market was DBRS. Moody’s Investors Service rated 69.7 percent of the non-mortgage ABS issued in 2012 as of the end of the third quarter, down slightly from its 70.4 percent share of the 2011 market. The company’s strengths were in vehicle finance and business loan ABS, where it captured more than three-quarters of new issuance by dollar volume. Standard & Poor’s ranked...[Includes two data charts]

According to the latest subprime servicer ranking from Inside Nonconforming Markets, only two major servicers increased their subprime portfolios at the end of the third quarter of 2012 compared with either the previous quarter or the third quarter of 2011: Ocwen Financial and Homeward Residential, which Ocwen intends to acquire in December. Both of the servicers – and eight of the top 15 subprime servicers – are nonbanks. Nonbank special servicers have increased their ... [Includes one data chart]

Redwood Trust issued a $301.46 million non-agency jumbo mortgage-backed security last week with the shortest seasoning period yet on the real estate investment trust’s post-crisis issuance. Loans included in the MBS were seasoned an average of 1.1 months due to Redwood’s increased loan purchase activity. Average loan seasoning on the eight other non-agency jumbo MBS deals issued by Redwood since 2010 has varied from 8.6 months on a deal in 2011 to 1.9 months on the deal Redwood issued in October ...

Mortgage lenders will be facing tougher enforcement if Congress decides to act on a series of proposals to hold lenders accountable for noncompliance with FHA policies and regulations. In the wake of an adverse actuarial report regarding the health of the FHA’s Mutual Mortgage Insurance Fund, Acting FHA Commissioner Carol Galante announced that the agency will seek new powers to recoup losses from lenders that originate bad FHA loans. The proposals are designed to provide the FHA with greater flexibility to revise policies and procedures to avoid unnecessary losses before they occur. They will also improve the agency’s ...

JPMorgan Securities and Credit Suisse Securities have agreed to pay more than $400 million combined to settle government charges that they misled investors in offerings of non-agency MBS from 2005 to 2010, according to the Securities and Exchange Commission. The SEC, working with the federal-state Residential MBS Working Group, reached separate settlement agreements with the two financial institutions after filing a complaint and issuing a cease-and-desist order. Neither JPMorgan nor Credit Suisse admitted to or denied the findings against them or any of their affiliates. The SEC alleged...

Ocwen Financial’s agreement in October to purchase reverse mortgage lender Genworth Financial Home Equity Access was the latest in an effort by special servicers to diversify their portfolios with reverse mortgages. Nationstar Mortgage burst onto the scene at the beginning of the year to become the largest reverse mortgage servicer and Walter Investment Management recently purchased Reverse Mortgage Solutions. Servicing reverse mortgages is much different than dealing with the ...

Wells Fargo originated the most rate-spread loans in 2011, according to an analysis by affiliated publication Inside Mortgage Finance of Home Mortgage Disclosure Act data compiled by ComplianceTech/Lending Patterns. The loans, also known as higher priced mortgages, are federal regulators’ proxy for subprime mortgages. Wells had $1.73 billion in rate-spread originations in 2011, accounting for 6.0 percent of such originations. While a number of lenders focused almost exclusively ... [Includes two data charts]

Reactions were mixed in the mortgage industry and on Capitol Hill on the heels of an independent actuarial study that projected a deficit of $16.3 billion in the FHA insurance fund and a negative1.44 percent capital reserve ratio. The FY2012 annual actuarial report to Congress on the condition of the Mutual Mortgage Insurance Fund reignited the debate on whether the FHA’s solvency issues may be resolved without a taxpayer bailout. The capital reserve ratio dropped from 0.24 percent at the end of FY2011, which is already way below the ...

The Department of Housing and Urban Development is taking aggressive actions to mitigate the negative impact of future Home Equity Conversion Mortgage books of business on the FHA Mutual Mortgage Insurance Fund. HUD said changes in borrower use of the HECM program, particularly among younger users, and the modeling changes in the FY2012 actuarial review of the MMI Fund show substantial stress in the HECM program. Besides softening the impact of HECM losses on the fund, the department wants to ensure that consumers are better protected and able to sustain their reverse mortgages. While the MMI Fund’s economic value fell to ... [1 chart]

The Department of Housing and Urban Development has announced changes to existing loss mitigation options to reduce the number of claims against the FHA Mutual Mortgage Insurance Fund.The changes will benefit qualified, distressed FHA borrowers, who will be able to qualify for FHA loss mitigation interventions and get more help than what was allowed under previous guidelines. HUD has issued a mortgagee letter to amend existing FHA Home Affordable Modification Program guidelines, the definition of “special forbearance,” and loss mitigation-priority guidelines. Specifically, HUD eliminated the ...