Cart

Inside MBS & ABS

September 5, 2008

View Archived Issues

MBS Issuance Slumps Again in August; GSEs Step Up Purchases But Lose Share to Ginnie Mae

New production of mortgage-backed securities fell again in August as Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac both saw further declines in issuance and the non-agency MBS market remained at a standstill. A total of $82.35 billion of mortgage pass-through securities were issued last month, down 3 percent from already depressed levels in July. Production for August was the lowest monthly... [Includes one graph] Read More

SIFMA Pushes Up the Start Date for Conforming Jumbo Mortgages Eligible for TBA Trading

Upon further review, Wall Street has decided to speed up by three months the start date for originating conforming jumbo mortgages eligible for delivery into to-be-announced pools. On Aug. 10, the Securities Industry and Financial Markets Association announced that higher-balance mortgages originated in pricey housing markets under the expanded conforming loan... Read More

Commercial Banks Focus on GNMA Pools In Second Quarter MBS Buying Spree

Commercial banks were aggressive buyers of Ginnie Mae MBS during the second quarter, according to a new Inside MBS & ABS ranking and analysis of call report data filed by large bank holding companies.Commercial banks held a record $1.064 trillion of MBS in portfolio as of the end of June, a 4.2 percent gain from the previous quarter. The industry held an estimated 16.2... [Includes three charts] Read More

Key New Hires Reshuffle the Industry’s Talent Pools; Goldman Sachs Picks Up Popular’s Subprime Business

The continuing turmoil and uncertainty in the mortgage and credit markets have created some key personnel acquisition opportunities for a few shops, while giving another major player the chance to pick up some subprime assets on the cheap to augment its existing servicing platform.This week, Merrill Lynch lured Michael Nierenberg from JPMorgan to head the firm’s global... Read More

DBRS Updates RMBS Methodology To Account for Market Declines

DBRS this week updated its assumptions about non-agency MBS due to the rapid declines in the housing market, following similar moves by Fitch Ratings and Standard & Poor in August. The update caused DBRS to downgrade 1,350 classes from 171 residential MBS transactions. Based on data from mortgage servicers and other industry sources, DBRS adjusted default and loss severity assumptions in... Read More

Fed Scholar Calls for Scrutiny of Off-Balance Sheet Vehicles, Stress Testing, Fair Value to Avoid Credit Crunch Redux

A visiting scholar at the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis found fault with the “originate to distribute” model of mortgage financing, urging policymakers to pay closer attention to off-balance sheet vehicles and to revisit the adequacy of stress testing and fair value accounting. “Only now are lessons being learned that will alter future operations of the financial... Read More

S&P, Moody’s Find More Deterioration In Prime Jumbo MBS Performance

The performance of jumbo MBS pools issued in recent years continued to weaken throughout the first half of 2008, according to separate updates released in late August by Moody’s Investors Service and Standard and Poor’s. “Pools of both first- and second-lien loans issued in 2006 and 2007 and across the credit spectrum continue to suffer from difficult market conditions, with... Read More

MBA Applauds Project RESTART, But Says Plenty of Work Needs to be Done

Mortgage lenders are eager to see the non-agency MBS market reinvigorated, but they think the American Securitization Forum may be seeking to impose too big of an information burden on issuers. The ASF’s Project RESTART, which was announced July 16, was designed to increase liquidity and improve pricing on non-agency MBS. Set for implementation during the first quarter of 2009, the... Read More

Latest Imf News

More Imf News

Featured Data

More Featured Data

Featured Reports

More Latest Reports

Featured Poll

As homeowner equity continues to build, more and more lenders are launching home equity lending products. Are you thinking of joining this market?

View Results