Servicing

Home prices have fallen nearly 4% from October 2009 to October 2010, according to CoreLogic's housing price index, which includes sales of foreclosed properties. Since July, the HPI has declined for three consecutive months.

The Federal Home Loan Bank of Atlanta on Thursday named W. Wesley McMullan as its new president and chief executive.

U.S. AgBank and CoBank, two of the five banks in the Farm Credit System, intend to pursue a merger in 2011.

Loan brokers enjoyed a slight gain in their market share during a very strong third quarter for originations, but are still seeing their business come under pressure.

Ginnie Mae has repurchased $4.5 billion of delinquent loans out of securitized pools this year in an effort to reduce losses on servicing portfolios it inherited from LendAmerica and other defaulted issuers.

Single-family housing starts jumped almost 7% in November from the prior month to the highest level since April.

Bank of America Corp. has begun potential settlement discussions with large institutional investors who bought MBS that later underperformed, causing losses at these entities, according to a report in The Wall Street Journal.

Standard & Poor's has placed 1,196 ratings on 129 U.S. residential mortgage-backed securities re-REMIC transactions on CreditWatch with negative implications until it finishes correcting its assessments of timely interest payments in some circumstances.

Ginnie Mae issuers securitized $34.4 billion of government guaranteed residential mortgages in November, down 3% from the prior month.

The California Public Employees' Retirement System this week suspended its mortgage program, citing rising delinquencies and declining usage by its target audience: state workers. The program's administrator is Citigroup.