New prime jumbo residential mortgage-backed securities issuance looks on track to outpace last year's levels, Fitch Ratings announced Monday.
According to Fitch, eight jumbo RMBS deals came to market in the second quarter of 2015, bringing the year-to-date volume total up to $7.1 billion, on pace to surpass 2014's total volume of $8.3 billion. Fitch also sees RMBS total volume surpassing 2013's $13.1 billion.
"The slowly increasing pace of new RMBS issuance reflects more issuers willing to tap the market," said Fitch director Sean Nelson in a released statement.
At the same time, the performance of these bonds has been exceptional. "Only eight borrowers out of roughly 32,000 are more than three months behind on their mortgage," Nelson continued, explaining the strength of RMBS in the post-crisis era.
Fitch's report also cited a 50-basis-point drop in jumbo mortgage interest rates since the beginning of 2014 resulting in what the ratings agency defined as a modest increase in the speed of prepayments of the loans underlying the securities.
