Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac continued to trim their retained investment portfolios in late 2015 with most of the focus on shrinking their non-agency MBS and holdings of their own securities. Freddie Mac’s retained mortgage portfolio declined 15.1 percent last year, ending at $346.91 billion, safely below the $359.3 billion cap set by the Federal Housing Finance Agency. The government-sponsored enterprise reduced its non-agency MBS holdings by $25.60 billion, or 38.8 percent, from its yearend 2014 level. While that included hefty declines in both subprime and Alt A MBS, the biggest decline, 41.3 percent, was...[Includes one data table]
One of those GSE watchers is Bose George of Keefe, Bruyette & Woods, who told us: “I see no reason for the administration to negotiate in any meaningful way with the plaintiffs..."
The Obama administration’s recently proposed federal budget is projecting a $61 million profit for the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Section 502 single-family guaranteed housing program in FY 2017. The president’s budget proposal projects $900 million in new direct USDA rural housing mortgage loans in fiscal 2017, the same number of loans projected for fiscal 2016. For 2017, the USDA is seeking...
Carol Galante, former head of the FHA, has been named to Ocwen Financial’s board of directors. Galante left the FHA in August 2014 to take on the position of faculty director with the Terner Center for Housing Innovation at the University of California, Berkeley. Current director Phyllis Caldwell was elevated...
"Assuming we achieve our cost, volume and other business objectives, and the market unfolds as forecast, we expect core earnings before notable items to be breakeven to modestly profitable for 2016," said CEO Glen Messina.
Originators that fund billions of dollars each quarter use futures and options to hedge their pipelines. It’s the smaller players that may have encountered secondary-market charges.
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