The mortgage industry told the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau that the recent state attorneys general settlement contains a robust set of consumer protections that ought to be used as the framework for developing national servicing standards. However, industry representatives expressed concern that such an initiative could create additional barriers to entry to the servicing business. “First and foremost, the AG settlement will provide substantial relief to homeowners and will establish significant new homeowner protections for the future,” the Mortgage Bankers Association said in a recent...

Lenders, home builders and affiliated settlement service companies are lobbying the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau to preserve the ability of affiliated settlement service providers to do business with one another under the final ability-to-repay/qualified mortgage rule the agency is charged with writing. “We strongly support a competitive mortgage market where builders and lenders large and small, unaffiliated and affiliated, as well as other settlement service providers actively compete to provide sound mortgage products and ancillary settlement services to consumers,” said the Leading...

Nearly two months after the House and Senate overwhelmingly voted to curtail bonus payments to Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac executives, congressional lawmakers last week approved a final bill to send to the president’s desk for signature. Among the amendments included in the Stop Trading on Congressional Knowledge Act of 2012 – which would bar members of Congress and staffers from using non-public, inside information for personal benefit – are prohibitions on bonus payments to top executives of the two government-sponsored enterprises while they remain in conservatorship. The STOCK Act also...

The Treasury Department this week finished winding down its holdings of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac MBS, claiming a positive return of $25 billion for the U.S. taxpayers from a market stabilization initiative launched in the teeth of the 2008 financial market meltdown. Treasury’s holdings of MBS issued by the two government-sponsored enterprises peaked at $197.6 billion in December 2009. “These MBS purchases helped preserve access to mortgage credit during a period of unprecedented market stress,” the agency said. The Federal Reserve agency MBS investment program was far bigger, peaking at $1.12...

Last week, the 2nd Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that Judge Jed Rakoff of the District Court for the Southern District of New York erred when he blocked the $285 million agreement the Securities and Exchange Commission and Citigroup struck to settle a dispute over MBS that later turned toxic when the market tanked. Market observers think it likely means the settlement is back on track, and a good sign for the market, “with sanity and certainty prevailing,” as one put it. In U.S. Securities & Exchange Commission v. Citigroup Global Markets Inc., the district court this past November refused to approve a...

The Federal Housing Finance Agency is calling for Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to conduct an analysis of the viability of each company’s multifamily operations without government guarantees, suggesting the possibility of separating the two government-sponsored enterprises’ multifamily and single-family businesses. The GSEs’ mandated review of their multifamily operations is part of the FHFA’s 2012 “conservatorship scorecard” unveiled two weeks ago, which outlines the specific objectives and timelines for the Finance Agency’s strategic plan for the conservatorships of Fannie and Freddie. The multifamily...

The Financial Industry Regulatory Authority, a non-governmental watchdog of the securities industry, has asked the Securities and Exchange Commission to approve proposed amendments designed to increase transparency in to-be-announced transactions involving agency pass-through MBS. The proposed rule changes would establish clear requirements for reporting TBA transactions that are “for good delivery” (GD) or “not for good delivery” (NGD) to enhance the ability of investors to negotiate fair and competitive prices for agency MBS. Based on market standards, the GD and NGD classifications were...

The Federal Housing Finance Agency is looking for two good chief executives who are willing to work a “thankless job” for substantially reduced pay and the chance to oversee the transition of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac from private companies to government entities and perhaps eventually out of business altogether. Working closely with the two GSEs, the Finance Agency is in the midst of discussions with candidates to fill the CEO vacancies at both Fannie and Freddie, according to FHFA Acting Director Edward DeMarco.

The Home Affordable Refinance Program recorded a significant decrease in December despite the implementation of some new HARP 2.0 standards that took hold during the final month of 2011, according to the Federal Housing Finance Agency. The FHFA’s latest foreclosure prevention and refinance report released this week noted that all HARP refis fell 36 percent to 23,323 in December from 36,304 in November.