The statute requires the GSEs to serve three specific underserved markets: manufactured housing, affordable housing preservation, and rural housing by increasing secondary market liquidity...
The three most notable aspects of Janet Yellen’s final press conference as the chair of the Federal Re-serve were the expected comments in support of the central bank’s 25 basis point rate increase, positive economic expectations of pending tax reform efforts, and confirmation the Fed is unlikely to provide much information about its balance sheet reduction going forward.
Participants in the commercial MBS market appear to have some certainty regarding the use of third-party purchasers to meet risk-retention requirements. The Securities and Exchange Commission seems to have helped resolve concerns about the accounting treatment for such deals, though a formal statement hasn’t been issued.
The Federal Home Loan Bank of Seattle lost an appeal in an MBS case against Barclays Capital this week in which it claimed the investment banker made false statements or left out certain facts about the securities it sold in 2008. But the Court of Appeals of Washington State ruled that theFHLBank was fully aware of what it was buying at the time.
Mortgages with high home price-to-income ratios tend to perform worse than mortgages with lower PTI ratios, according to economists at the Federal Reserve. The analysts suggest that PTI ratios are a helpful tool for gauging mortgage risk by tracking housing affordability. “Banks that have greater exposure of mortgages to high PTI regions have higher mortgage delinquency and charge-off rates and significantly higher probabilities of failure, even after controlling for ...