Ocwen Financial Corp. is poised to significantly expand its mortgage servicing business with the acquisition of Litton Loan Servicing from Goldman Sachs Group for approximately $264 million. The sale price does not reflect certain assets that Goldman will retain, the investment bank said in a June 6 statement announcing the deal. The bank did not specify which assets would be excluded from the transaction. The planned sale will end...

The use of Federal Home Loan Bank advances among their bank and thrift members fell overall during both the first quarter of 2011 and on a yearly basis, with two of the three largest users showing a drop-off larger than the overall industry’s year-over-year rate of decline, according to the Inside Mortgage Finance Bank Mortgage Database.

Banks reported a significant decline in the volume of mortgage repurchases and indemnifications they recorded during the first quarter of 2011, but buybacks clearly continue to weigh on mortgage banking profitability. According to a new call report analysis by Inside Mortgage Trends, banks reported a total of $3.83 billion in mortgage repurchases and indemnifications during the first quarter. That was down 19.2 percent from the previous three-month period.The buyback problem has clearly improved since the nine months between the... [includes one data chart and one graph]

A steep decline in loan origination activity dragged mortgage banking income during the first quarter of 2011 to its lowest level in over two years, according to a new Inside Mortgage Trends analysis. Earnings reports filed by 21 major mortgage lenders showed aggregate mortgage banking income of $3.097 billion for... [Includes one data chart and one graph]

The average mortgage banking business reported increased profitability in the fourth quarter of last year, but 2010 didn’t match the industry’s success back in 2009, according to the latest Mortgage Bankers Performance Report from the Mortgage Bankers Association. The average firm participating in the MBA survey reported...

The Treasury Department this week announced that it is withholding servicer incentive payments for the three largest lenders in the industry following compliance reviews that found them needing significant improvement in their Home Affordable Modification Program activity. The three servicers – Bank of America, JPMorgan Chase and Wells Fargo – each typically collect about $7 million a month in servicer compensation for non-agency mortgages, according to an Inside Mortgage Trends analysis of Treasury data. Treasury found a fourth servicer – Ocwen Financial – was also in need of...[contains one data chart]

Using consumer behavior analytics, FICO said it has developed a method to profile so-called “strategic defaulters” in order to determine who is most likely to try to skip out on their mortgage loans. The credit-assessment firm, best known for its FICO credit score, said its research improves on...

Even though only 14 servicers were ordered by federal regulators to change some of their practices, there is a general understanding that the rest of the industry will also have to adhere to some of the new standards just to keep up and avoid future problems, according to experts at a webinar hosted this week by...

Even though the collapse in the mortgage market took down some bigger lenders structured as real estate investment trusts, the surviving REITs have emerged stronger and some are edging back into originations. Market capitalization for the sector has surged, from about $1.6 billion in 2000 to $36.1 billion (residential) as of May 31, 2011, according to a new report by analysts at Keefe Bruyette & Woods. But there have been some pretty big sinkholes along the way, with Thornburg Mortgage and New Century forced to shutter their operations. Their demise represented a combined loss of...

The two leading accounting standards-setting bodies have different approaches when it comes to how best to analyze the effectiveness of a mortgage lending or other financial hedging strategy. And as they seek to improve, simplify and harmonize their approaches, the mortgage industry has come out in support of...