The Federal Home Loan Bank of Cincinnati says a unit of Lehman Brothers Holdings is not entitled to a multimillion dollar payday because the FHLBank did not short change the firm when it closed out swaps and options transactions ahead of Lehman’s 2008 bankruptcy. Last week, Lehman filed a breach of contract lawsuit in Manhattan federal court connected to 87 derivative transactions or interest-rate swaps with the FHLBank that fell apart when Lehman entered bankruptcy on Sept. 15, 2008, at the height of the financial crisis.According to its lawsuit, Lehman says the Cincinnati Bank violated its agreement by paying only $13.7 million when the transactions were terminated due to the firm’s Chapter 11 filing.

Freddie Mac is getting the word out early that it is phasing out its software for managing delinquent home loans with plans to discontinue the service altogether next year. The company has already stopped registering new customers for EarlyIndicator, Freddie’s Windows-based program used to predict loan delinquency. "To provide users with time to transition, we are letting them know we are retiring EarlyIndicator one year in advance,” Freddie said in its announcement earlier this month.

Most companies reported declining earnings from their mortgage banking businesses during the first quarter of 2013, according to a new analysis by Inside Mortgage Trends. As a group, however, the 23 diverse businesses included in the round-up posted a surprising 34.2 percent increase in aggregate mortgage banking earnings compared to the fourth quarter. The aggregate mortgage banking income was $6.74 billion for the group, a $1.72 billion increase over the previous quarter. Virtually all of that increase could be attributed to one company, Bank of America, which bounced back from a $540 million net loss during the fourth quarter to a $1.26 billion profit in early 2013 – a $1.80 billion turnaround. BofA took...[Includes one data chart]

Almost one in five mortgage lenders in the country is still actively considering switching to a new loan origination platform, driven largely by the need to keep up with increasing regulation and, to a lesser extent, the desire for new features to gain or keep a competitive edge in the marketplace. According to the seventh annual compliance survey by QuestSoft, a provider of mortgage compliance software based in Laguna Hills, CA, 18.6 percent of lenders are reevaluating their current LOS platform, up from 0.1 percent in last year’s survey. Historically, the percentage of lenders considering an LOS change hovered...

The Financial Stability Oversight Council issued a warning this week regarding the prolonged period of low interest rates, singling out real estate investment trusts that invest in agency mortgage-backed securities. “Agency REITs, a sector that how grown considerably in recent years, are highly exposed to a rise in interest rates,” said Trent Reasons, a senior policy advisor at the Treasury Department. An analysis of 16 REITs by Inside MBS & ABS, an affiliated publication, determined...

The non-distressed property market is strong and being driven by borrowers in need of mortgage financing, according to the latest Campbell/Inside Mortgage Finance HousingPulse Tracking Survey results. Thomas Popik, research director for Campbell Surveys, said time-on-market trends, number of offers and sales-to-list price ratios all indicate an exceptionally strong market for non-distressed properties. “The metrics for this segment are not affected by policy decisions at mortgage servicers to release or not release distressed properties onto the market,” he noted. The average number of offers for non-distressed properties, based on a three-month moving average, hit...

Owner-occupants are driving increases in home prices and purchase activity, not institutional investors, according to Oliver Chang. The somewhat surprising conclusions from the founder and managing director of Sylvan Road Capital suggest that institutional investors are “along for the ride,” not propelling the current housing recovery. “The housing recovery appears to be broad-based and here to stay, although not because of the entrance of institutional investors into the space,” Chang said. He completed...

National MI, a new entrant in the private mortgage insurance market, began issuing its first commitments this month, although company officials acknowledge that a lot of the company’s operations are still being put together. In fact, building a new MI from scratch with state-of-the-art technology and no hangover from the housing collapse is one of National MI’s key advantages, officials said. “2013 is...

Fannie Mae is making it easier for small and medium-sized lenders to deliver electronic mortgages to the government-sponsored enterprise. “Currently, lenders are required to obtain a variance to their master agreement in order to deliver electronic mortgage loans (eMortgages) to Fannie Mae,” the GSE said in a recent selling guide announcement. “Fannie Mae would like to expand...

Private mortgage insurers provided coverage on some $8.2 billion of mortgages securitized by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac during the first quarter of 2013 that had loan-to-value ratios exceeding 105 percent, according to a new Inside Mortgage Finance analysis of loan-level data. Private MIs had little choice in the matter since the Home Affordable Refinance Program allows underwater borrowers to refinance without getting additional MI, or any mortgage insurance if the original loan wasn’t insured. In fact, Fannie and Freddie securitized a total of $27.1 billion of mortgages with LTV ratios over 105 percent, most of which did not have insurance. But most private MI coverage was placed...[Includes one data chart]