With just $1 trillion in originations expected this year, lenders and servicers are trimming their payrolls accordingly.

Will loan production in the second half surprise the naysayers? Will non-QM lending take off? Stay tuned...

The most encouraging sign is that agency volume has been gaining pace. Production increased by 11.4 percent from May to June, with $76.48 billion in gross issuance.

Investors that have bought stock – and debt instruments – in the MIs are anxious about the phase-in period for the capital standards.

Avalos’ resolution targets approximately 300 underwater private-label security loans that were made on homes “particularly concentrated in San Francisco’s historically black, Latino and Asian working class communities.”

As for the two banks working on jumbo securities, both have not issued any bonds in recent years but “are getting their securitization machines ready,” said one jumbo executive.

York Capital is backing Walter Capital Opportunity Corp., the buyer of the excess MSRs.

As of May, only three of the loans were 30-days delinquent, with the other once-delinquent mortgages having returned to current status or paid off.

Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac issued $141.83 billion of single-family MBS during the second quarter, an encouraging 9.4 percent increase from the dreary levels recorded in the first three months of 2014.

A tax "extender" for mortgage insurance would help an already-healthy MI industry.