Companies that have received government subpoenas for electronically stored information (ESI) in connection with federal investigations of financial fraud and other white-collar crimes might find some relief in two recent court rulings, according to a recent legal analysis. In a Dechert LLP legal update, attorneys Ben Barnett, Rebecca Kahan and Nathaniel Hopkins said heightened anti-fraud activities at the Department of Justice and the Securities and Exchange Commission have resulted in increased criminal prosecutions, criminal probes and enforcement actions. Many of these actions have shown...
Affordable housing advocates are praising the leadership of the Senate Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs Committee for including a “robust dedicated source of revenue” for the National Housing Trust Fund in their bipartisan housing-finance reform legislation. A provision of the legislation filed by Sens. Tim Johnson, D-SD, and Mike Crapo, R-ID, would expand both the base and the rate for the National Housing Trust Fund and the Capital Magnet Fund. Current law provides...
An array of advocacy groups – both well established and newly formed – have stepped up their lobbying efforts as the Senate Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs Committee moves toward a scheduled markup of increasingly controversial mortgage-finance reform legislation. A lot of the noise is coming from disenfranchised investors in Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac junior preferred stock and common stock who want to scuttle the bipartisan reform bill put together by Sens. Tim Johnson, D-SD, and Mike Crapo, R-ID. Their legislation is silent on the fate of public stockholders of the two government-sponsored enterprises, and it leaves intact the conservatorship arrangement that strips virtually all the capital from the two GSEs every quarter. In a press conference called by Investors Unite, a group of individual GSE shareholders, and consumer advocate Ralph Nader’s Shareholder Respect, CapWealth Advisor CEO Tim Pagliara predicted...
Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac securitized just $29.95 billion of single-family mortgages with private mortgage-insurance coverage during the first quarter of 2014, a 30.9 percent decline from the previous period, according to a new Inside Mortgage Finance analysis and ranking. The steepness of the private MI downturn was in line with the 29.1 percent downturn in overall business at the two government-sponsored enterprises from the fourth quarter of 2013. And the flow of private MI loans in early 2014 was down 40.2 percent from the first quarter of last year, a less severe drop than the 63.7 swoon in the overall GSE market over that period. The biggest decline in MI-insured business was in underwater mortgages that were refinanced while keeping their existing coverage under the Home Affordable Refinance Program...[Includes two data charts]
The biggest decline in MI-insured business was in underwater mortgages that were refinanced while keeping their existing coverage under the Home Affordable Refinance Program.
The nation’s banks and thrifts used a combined $406.1 billion in advances as of Dec. 31, 2013, up 26.7 percent from the third quarter and a 21.6 percent increase from the same period a year earlier.
Mortgage banking is an ugly business right now, but lenders are hoping that the first quarter will prove to be the nadir and that better times are ahead.
Commercial banks and savings institutions reported severe declines in secondary market mortgage sales during 2013, including a sharp 38.4 percent drop in the fourth quarter. Bank and thrift mortgage sales totaled $1.208 trillion last year, according to an Inside Mortgage Trends analysis of call-report data. That was down 16.5 percent from 2012. Banks and thrifts originated fewer loans as well, but loan sales declined more than total originations, indicating that many lenders retained new production for their portfolios. The industry reported $618.4 billion in retail originations through their mortgage-banking operations, along with $801.2 billion in wholesale production. Both figures were down from the previous year, and [includes a two-page chart]...
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