Origination

Moody's Investors Service Tuesday afternoon downgraded its ratings on 272 tranches of payment option ARM MBS issued by Countrywide Financial Corp. In total, $19.1 billion of securities are affected.

BlackRock Inc. hopes to purchase upwards of $250 million of jumbo loans each quarter with an eye toward securitizing the product.

When Bank of America said it was exiting the wholesale channel in early October, all looked bleak for loan brokers, which depend on such firms. After all, if the nation's No. 3 ranked table funder is getting out, that's not a good sign, or so went the conventional thinking.

Greg Ousley wants to be a chaperone of sorts for the secondary mortgage market. The chief executive of Global Debt Registry says his company's system, which was designed to track ownership of delinquent credit card debts, can improve upon the widely used Mortgage Electronic Registration System.

Commercial banks and savings institutions originated $162 billion of single-family loans through retail outlets in the third quarter, a 22% jump from 2Q, according to new figures released by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp.

Sales of existing homes fell in October to an annual rate of 4.43 million units, a small decline from the prior month, but a 26% plunge from the same month a year ago, according to new figures released by the National Association of Realtors.

Freddie Mac purchased $39.6 billion of mortgages from its seller/servicers in October, flat from the previous month, but a 23% jump from the same period a year ago.

Freddie Mac is creating a new securitization option for lenders that originate "jumbo/super conforming" fixed-rate mortgages that have a maximum loan limit of up to $729,750.

Berkadia Commercial Mortgage is adding a fixed-rate loan for inclusion in new commercial mortgage-backed securities to the products offered through its national mortgage banking network.

Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac and the GSE regulators are reminding lenders that the maximum mortgage amount for conforming mortgages will remain unchanged for the first nine months of 2011.