Origination

Mortgage applications decreased last week from the previous week, led by a drop in purchase loan requests.

First Commonwealth Financial Corp. in Indiana, Pa., has launched a new residential mortgage banking division.

"The real question for me is should we be in the FHA business at all," the CEO says.

PennyMac Mortgage Investment Trust has entered into a repurchase agreement with Bank of America to finance roughly $550 million in newly originated mortgage loans, though its subsidiary PennyMac Operating Partnership.

The Federal Home Loan Bank of Chicago is launching a pilot program soon to buy home loans and issue Ginnie Mae securities. The program could allow community banks and credit unions to stay in the mortgage business.

The CFPB's guidance provides no specific rules or bright lines – leaving the agency the flexibility to call it how it sees it and reflecting a desire to regulate through enforcement.

Harbinger Group, a holding company in New York, has agreed to acquire a majority interest in CorAmerica Capital, a commercial real estate firm in Los Angeles.

“Under the terms of this settlement, the bank has admitted to its misdeeds in great detail,” U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder said.

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau says brokers will have to comply with compensation limits even if they are funding loans via a warehouse line of credit.

Wells Fargo executives said they support federal regulators' effort to expand mortgage credit availability but cautioned that it will produce little benefit for the bank's, or the industry's, bottom line.