Secondary

Credit Plus in Salisbury, Md., has introduced loan repurchase insurance for mortgage lenders and servicers that use its verification products.

Activist investor Carl Icahn, who's pushing American International Group Inc. Chief Executive Officer Peter Hancock to shrink the insurer and boost returns, said the CEO must offer "a drastic strategic shift" at a presentation scheduled for next week. Icahn's plan includes splitting AIG into three units, one being United Guaranty Corp., a private mortgage insurer.

Agency and government loan programs will be a little different in the next 12 months. There also will be new rules for private-label securitizations, along with new products available to investors. Here is an overview.

Mortgage real estate investment trusts will be hurt modestly in the long run, now that they have been excluded from membership in the Federal Home Loan Bank System, according to Fitch Ratings.

Goldman Sachs said it agreed to settle a U.S. probe into its handling of mortgage-backed securities for about $5.1 billion, cutting its fourth-quarter profit by about $1.5 billion.

Interest rates on fixed-rate mortgages fell further this week due to overseas turmoil, according to Freddie Mac.

Spreads widened on Freddie Mac's latest offering of Structured Agency Credit Risk securities as investors demanded additional compensation for taking on the credit risk of mortgages insured by the company.

Community bankers and credit unions scored a significant victory while others in the mortgage industry lost out in the Federal Housing Finance Agency's final rule establishing membership standards for the Home Loan banks.

Private-label investors in residential mortgage-backed securities should be at only modest risk for noncompliance with TILA-RESPA integrated disclosure requirements, according to Fitch Ratings.

Amherst Holdings plans to market $400 million worth of bonds backed by single-family rental homes, according to Trepp.