Although Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac are not directly involved with the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau’s eClosing pilot project, Federal Housing Finance Agency Director Mel Watt said that the GSEs have been writing loans or purchasing e-mortgages from approved lenders. “We have found that if we’re going to be a part of the new normal and participate in it as Fannie and Freddie, we’ve got to figure out a way to get to the millenials,” he said, adding that they don’t communicate in the same way as previous generations. “So movement in this direction is critically important. And if we can use this process to get more engagement by millenials in the process, I think it would be advantageous to us.”

FHLB Will Stay in Topeka. After mulling a move to places like Kansas City and Denver, the Federal Home Loan Bank of Topeka said it would stay put and build a new headquarters there. Construction on the $26 million, 80,000 square foot building will begin next year and employees anticipate a move to the new building in 2018. The bank needed a more modern and larger space than its current 60,000 square foot location offers. Freddie Prices $471 Million K-Deal. Freddie Mac priced a new offering of Structured Pass-Through Certificates backed by fixed-rate multifamily mortgages with seven-year terms. The company plans to issue more than $471 million in K-719 Certificates, which is expected to settle around Aug. 19. This is Freddie’s 15th K Certificate offering this year.

A big part of Freddie’s sharp increase in issuance came from the $8.00 billion of seasoned loans the company securitized in July.

Timeshare collateral has displayed consistent year-over-year improvement since 2012.

Although all 13 firms reported positive earnings on their origination and sales activity, many noted that production-related revenue did not keep pace...

The Federal Home Loan Bank system earned $678 million in the second quarter of 2015 and attributes the 32 percent year-over-year increase to higher gains on litigation settlements and derivatives as well as hedging activities. Total net income for the first half of the year was even higher than the previous year, according to figures compiled by the system’s Office of Finance. Net income for the first six months witnessed a 58 percent jump, to $1.69 billion. Litigation settlements accounted for $143 million in the second quarter, driven by FHLBank of Boston’s $135 million settlement. Those claims came directly from investments in non-agency mortgage-backed securities. Total FHLB assets for the first half of the year were pretty much flat at $916.9 billion, representing...

Real estate investment trusts that focus on the MBS market saw the value of their holdings slump again during the volatile second quarter of 2015. Top mortgage REITs reported a fair market value of $249.10 billion for their single-family MBS holdings as of the end of June. That was down 5.6 percent from the previous quarter, and it was the group’s lowest MBS portfolio valuation since the fourth quarter of 2011. The decline came...[Includes one data table]

HUD said it has been “working aggressively” with its web contractor, which it did not identify, to restore the system.

It was the group’s lowest MBS portfolio valuation since the fourth quarter of 2011.

The application of capital requirements to MBS and other structured finance products in the coming years will likely trump any typical collateral analysis investors currently consider, according to analysts at Standard & Poor’s. In a report published late last week, the analysts said global capital requirements have the potential to become impediments to providing financing via securitized products. “Of particular investor focus recently are...