Servicing

The outcry against the financial sector has taken yet another turn, this time with a petition calling on the Minneapolis School Board to move its payroll and other accounts from Wells Fargo to a local community bank as a way to highlight the connection between foreclosures and local school systems.

The Federal Housing Finance Agency has the expertise to set servicing, underwriting, and mortgage securitization standards that could lead to the development of a private-label MBS market, according to the GSE regulator.

A Senate panel wants the chief GSE regulator to explain why Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac executives continue to receive millions of dollars in bonus money for running the giant mortgage companies which continually need government assistance to stay afloat.

Ally Financial Corp. this week announced what it calls "modest" layoffs in its correspondent lending division, but declined to specify how many workers were cut.

Efforts to reinstate the $729,750 maximum loan limit for Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac and FHA loans has garnered the support of 137 House members, including 25 Republicans.

With the winter months quickly approaching, there seems to be an ominous picture for national home prices.

Two Harbors Investment Corp., a hybrid single-family residential mortgage REIT, recorded net GAAP earnings of $54.6 million during the third quarter when it completed a secondary stock offering and repositioned its portfolio to anticipate the HARP program change.

CoreLogic posted a net loss of $107 million off revenue of $348 million, the result of substantial losses from the discontinued operations of five business units in the third quarter of 2011. The results compare to a net loss of $93 million off revenue of $330 million in 3Q10.

It may have been Raj Date's first time testifying before Congress as the interim head of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, but Republicans did not let him off easy.

Federal Reserve chairman Ben Bernanke Wednesday afternoon said the central bank might scale up its purchases of agency mortgage-backed securities if conditions warrant, but not right now.