Treasury Eyeballing CFPB Rules as Part of Regulatory Relief Review. The Treasury Department is focused on a wide range of regulatory requirements where simple communication and clarification of the regulatory intent is warranted, such as the CFPB’s ability-to-repay rule, the integrated disclosure rule and the Home Mortgage Disclosure Act rule, Craig Phillips, counselor to the Treasury secretary, said during a symposium in New York City last week, according to Inside Mortgage Finance.... Dodd-Frank Changes to be Discussed. House Financial Services Committee Chairman Jeb Hensarling, R-TX, is scheduled to discuss his Dodd-Frank Act alternative, H.R. 10, the Financial CHOICE Act, Tuesday of this week at an event at the American Enterprise Institute....
Federal Housing Finance Agency Director Mel Watt’s comments last week that he’s prepared to allow the GSEs to build a capital buffer to avoid a Treasury draw was met with both applause and concern. But this week, Bob Ryan, special director to Watt, clarified the comments stating that the plan would entail delaying the dividend payments to the U.S. Treasury Department and not suspending them. Ryan, speaking during a credit-risk transfer symposium in New York City, kicked off the first five minutes of a panel discussion about GSE reform by talking about the potential capital buffer plan. He said that it would be done strictly for the purpose of avoiding draws on the “limited resources of the preferred stock purchase agreement.”
Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac credit-risk transfer programs have evolved from their prior business model but the market still has a ways to go before it fully matures, according to Federal Housing Finance Agency Director Mel Watt.Watt noted that the GSEs have made a tremendous amount of progress on credit risk transfers in a short amount of time, increasing their transaction volume from an unpaid principle balance of $90 billion in 2013 to $548 billion in 2016.“From 2013 through the end of 2016, the enterprises have transferred a meaningful portion of credit losses on a combined $1.4 trillion in mortgages, with a risk in force of about $49 billion,” said Watt, while...
Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac have proposed to pilot chattel loan programs within the next couple of years, but the manufactured industry wasn’t exactly impressed. Early last week, the GSEs released draft proposals detailing how they plan to boost underserved manufactured housing, rural housing and affordable housing preservation markets for low- and moderate-income families over the next three years. Under the Federal Housing Finance Agency’s duty-to-serve requirement, Fannie and Freddie are charged with coming up with ways to increase financing in those three areas. The drafted plans are part of an extended implementation process. The GSEs admitted there is not much information available about chattel lending and said...
The average daily trading volume in agency MBS totaled $195.7 billion in April, the lowest reading of the year and third worst over the past 12 months, according to figures compiled by the Securities Industry and Financial Markets Association. The low trading volume is an indication that liquidity is drying up, but it also reflects a decline in new agency MBS being created. According to figures recently compiled by Inside MBS & ABS, lenders issued...
President Trump’s tax plan would raise the federal debt, but could benefit residential MBS, consumer ABS and asset-backed commercial paper, depending mostly on the effect on the underlying obligors’ after-tax income, according to a recent research report from Moody’s Investors Service. “The administration’s blueprint proposes a reduction in the corporate tax rate to 15 percent from 35 percent, which would also apply to partnerships and other ‘pass-through’ businesses that are currently taxed through their principals’ individual returns,” analysts explained. The White House plan also features...
The Securities and Exchange Commission this week charged two former head traders who ran the commercial MBS desk at Nomura Securities International with lying intentionally to customers to boost the profits of the firm as well as their commissions. The SEC complaint alleged that traders James Im and Kee Chan inflated the price on CMBS they bought and sold for customers on the secondary market. In certain instances, the two traders allegedly pretended they were negotiating bond purchases with a third-party seller at a higher price when Nomura had already purchased the bonds at a lower price. According to the SEC, the fraud generated...
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