Will retired Fannie Mae chairman James Johnson come back into the mortgage industry to managehis former firm's chief competitor? As the sun went down on Friday, it seemed assured that within a few days FreddieMac's Greg Parseghian would be gone as CEO, a job he's held for less than 90 days. Sources familiar withthe matter say three names are being kicked around to replace Mr. Parseghian: Mr. Johnson, soon-to-be departingTreasury official Peter Fisher, and former Bush administration economic advisor Larry Lindsey. Thebelief is that one of these three could be named interim CEO while the company cleans house and searches for apermanent director. To say the least, the situation was fluid as this weekend column went to press. One thing isfor certain: whoever replaces Mr. Parseghian likely will be a company outsider. One seller/servicer suggested thatFreddie's board needs to clean house of all those with close ties to ousted chairman/CEO Leland Brendseland president David Glenn. (Mr. Parseghian replaced Mr. Brendsel as CEO in early June.) The seller/servicer-- and others -- has suggested that Freddie might wish to clean house at its board as well...
One former GSE official told us that Freddie still has in its ranks a senior officer who 10 years back was reprimandedby management for purchasing stock options from at least one and maybe more than one company official. This activitywas in violation of the company's by-laws the source said...
If Mr. Parseghian does get ousted as CEO, would he be asked to remain to run the company's portfolio? Investmentbankers credit Mr. Parseghian with being the brains behind the portfolio. One investment banker added: "He'sthe whole brains behind the portfolio. Why shoot him?"...
While we're on the subject of scandals, the collapse of Capitol Commerce Mortgage of Sacramento, Calif.,had tongues wagging big time last week. One item missed by reporters is the fact that CapCom had been for saleand was still open for offers until, perhaps, earlier this year. We tracked down Aaron Emz of Wood Warren& Co., San Francisco, which had been peddling the company. Mr. Emz's response? "I'm not going to talkabout it," and then he hung up the phone. It looks as though some lucky buyer (and there were buyers, butno takers) dodged a bullet. CapCom had a debt-to-equity ratio of 50-1, a source said. See the National MortgageNews issue of Aug. 25 for complete details...
When it comes to earnings, Fannie and Freddie are usually the big kahuna's of mortgage banking. But take a lookat second-quarter earnings: Freddie is absent (because of its restatement/accounting scandal) and Fannie is just$82 million ahead of Washington Mutual. (WaMu earned $1.02 billion, Fannie $1.10 billion.) Wells FargoHome Mortgage and J.P. Morgan Chase are absent from the picture because these mega-banks -- both membersof FM Policy Focus -- think it's a good idea to hide their mortgage earnings from the public...
Membership is booming over at the National Reverse Mortgage Lenders Association. According to NRMLA'sDarryl Hicks (a former National Mortgage News reporter, by the way), the trade group now boasts 125members compared to 75 last year. NRMLA is holding its annual convention in Chicago in late September...
A subsidiary of Independence Community Bank, New York, has been granted approval by Fannie Mae as a delegatedunderwriting and servicing lender...
Lenders One Mortgage, St. Louis, a mortgage cooperative, is about to add its 50th member...
MORTGAGE PEOPLE: Richard Vonk has been named chief credit risk officer for Key Consumer Finance.He will report directly to consumer finance executive Michael A. Butler.
MORTGAGE DATA: National Mortgage News has just released the second-quarter edition of its QuarterlyData Report, which includes 50 tables, including rankings on the top prime and subprime lenders and servicers.Also available: a new "Card-QDR," which ranks the top players in the card industry. For informationon the mortgage QDR e-mail:
