More than two years have passed since Bank of America parted ways with Fannie Mae on selling new purchase-money loans to the government-sponsored enterprise and no remedy seems in sight regarding a resolution to the matter. “There’s no change that I’m aware of related to the Fannie Mae situation,” said a spokesman for the bank. “We’re able to handle our loan origination business just fine with Freddie Mac.” According to figures compiled by Inside MBS & ABS, BofA did sell...

MBS from Freddie Mac backed by modified mortgages offer investors protection from prepayment risk in an environment in which interest rates are expected to climb, according to analysts at Barclays Capital. The analysts said Freddie’s H-pools are particularly attractive, as the loans in the deals have been restructured under the Home Affordable Modification Program. Slightly more than $1.0 billion in H-pools have been issued, with the most recent activity in October. Barclays noted that Freddie could significantly increase its issuance of H-pools as the government-sponsored enterprise has accumulated a substantial amount of modified mortgages in its retained portfolio in recent years. Freddie had...

Fannie Mae late last week priced its third credit risk-sharing deal of 2014. The $2.05 billion note is the government-sponsored enterprise’s fourth and largest transaction under its Connecticut Avenue Securities series since the Federal Housing Finance Agency ordered both Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to shrink the GSEs’ role in the U.S. housing market last year. In its latest offering – Series 2014-C03 – Fannie included reference loans with original loan-to-value ratios of up to 97 percent and “is consistent with prior transactions.” Previous C-deal offerings included reference loans with up to 80 percent LTV ratios. “We’ve continued...

Flagstar, a thrift that is also the largest remaining depository in the table funding sector, earned $25.5 million in the second quarter compared to a $78.9 million loss in 1Q.

By comparison, in the first quarter of 2014, Freedom averaged $1.28 billion of originations per month.

The distribution of FHA borrower credit scores continued the migration seen in previous quarters, though at a slower pace in 1Q14.

Even if home prices fall by 10 percent, most borrowers in jumbo MBS issued in recent years will have more equity than they had at the time of origination, said Grant Bailey of Fitch Ratings.

But have layoffs by the megabanks hurt their ability to fund loans should mortgage rates fall further?

Few federal regulatory agencies are the objects of such scorn – and simultaneously such devotion – as the CFPB, reflecting the bitter partisan environment in which the bureau was created in the wake of the financial crisis. To its opponents, July 21, 2011, may as well be another “date which will live in infamy,” whereas to its supporters, the modern financial era might as well be divided into pre-CFPB time and post-CFPB time. Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-MA, the author of the concept that evolved into what is now the CFPB and the person tasked with getting the agency up and running, urged supporters of the bureau to keep up the fight. “It feels like yesterday that we were fighting for a strong ...

When it comes to the CFPB, beauty is in the eye of the beholder. While supporters remain ardently behind the mission of the primary agency dedicated to consumer protection, as far as critics are concerned, it’s the bureau itself that poses too much risk and is in need of reform. “The CFPB is exactly what everybody knew it would be: a very expansive, heavy-handed, imperially-minded bureaucracy, building their own luxurious palace,” said Alex Pollock, a resident fellow at the American Enterprise Institute and former president and CEO of the Federal Home Loan Bank of Chicago, during a Dodd-Frank Act-related conference call with the news media last week. “One of the important effects of the CFPB has been to ensure the ...