Interest in the structured-finance market remains strong, but issuers continue to struggle with regulations and sometimes limited demand for their offerings. Just over 6,000 people registered for the ABS Vegas conference this week sponsored by the Structured Finance Industry Group and Information Management Network, up from more than 5,300 registrants in 2014. Jade Friedensohn, a senior vice president at IMN, said the conference set an attendance record for the structured-finance industry. A poll of attendees by the conference organizers suggested...
Proponents of the non-agency MBS market continue to work on initiatives to revive the market, with progress somewhat slow but steady. The Treasury Department and the Structured Finance Industry Group are facilitating separate efforts to entice investors to buy new non-agency MBS. At the ABS Vegas conference sponsored by the Structured Finance Industry Group and Information Management Network this week, Olga Gorodetsky, a senior policy advisor at the Treasury, said there’s no timeframe for when the benchmark non-agency MBS the Treasury is trying to facilitate might be issued. “It will be market driven,” she said. Gorodetsky said...[Includes one data chart]
Standard & Poor’s emerged as the top rating service in both non-agency MBS and non-mortgage ABS securitizations in 2014, according to a new Inside MBS & ABS ranking. S&P rated $8.91 billion of non-agency MBS last year, or 25.4 percent of total issuance. Rating information is not available on most scratch-and-dent transactions and re-securitizations that are typically issued as private placements. S&P’s market share was down from 40.0 percent of non-agency MBS issued in 2013, when there were more transactions with multiple ratings. DBRS, which reports its ratings on re-securitizations, actually was involved...[Includes two data charts]
Were Bank of America, Citi and Chase manipulated into making donations to Democrat-leaning housing advocacy groups as part of their recent mortgage settlements with the Department of Justice? That seemed to be the implicit question underlying the grilling of a key Justice Department official by Republican members of a House Judiciary subcommittee during a hearing this week that focused on the donations the three mega-banks were directed to make to housing counseling groups as part of their $36.6 billion settlement with the DOJ. “The concern is...
A U.S. district court judge in Iowa recently dismissed a shareholder motion to vacate an amended agency agreement requiring Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to pay nearly all their quarterly profits to the Treasury equal to their net worth. Filed by Continental Western Insurance Company, the lawsuit is similar to another case, Perry Capital, Inc. v. Lew, filed by the plaintiff’s parent, Berkley Regional Insurance Co., and Berkley Insurance Co. against the Federal Housing Finance Agency…
The Federal Housing Finance Agency isn’t providing a timetable on when it might decide the thorny issue of captive insurance companies becoming members in the Federal Home Loan Bank system. In a recent press briefing, FHFA Director Mel Watt also clarified that he is not presuming that any current members or applicants want to “abuse” their membership benefits, but said the agency must still go through the process of fielding comments on a proposal that would effectively ban captives from joining the system.Roughly 18 current members of the FHLBanks are affected by the proposed ban, seven of which are affiliated with real estate investment trusts. Captives do not write coverage outside of their own company. Traditional insurance companies that ...
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit recently affirmed that federal mortgage programs and their administrators, including Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, are exempt statutorily exempt from state and local taxation of real property transfers. The panel – consisting of Circuit Court Judges Richard Paez, Jay Bybee and Consuelo Callahan – held that because Congress had power to regulate the secondary mortgage market, it was authorized under the “Necessary and Proper Clause” to create Fannie and Freddie and to ensure their preservation by exempting them from state and local taxes. Brought by the City of Spokane, WA, the lawsuit is part of a wave of similar filings throughout the country to challenge the GSE exemption from ...
Lender-placed insurance continues to simmer amid regulatory scrutiny and ongoing court battles, according to a recent BuckleySandler analysis. While the largest LPI class-action lawsuits have settled, servicers and LPI providers remain entangled in appeals of those settlements and in individual borrower lawsuits, said authors Robyn Quattrone and Stephen LeBlanc, partner and associate, respectively, with the Washington, DC, law firm. In addition, federal ...
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