Capital markets

Combining Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae’s MBS in the TBA market sounds like it is not impossible, but is much easier said than done.

The latest round of weaker-than-expected U.S. employment numbers has driven the long-term rate-indicative 10-year Treasury yield to yet another record low.

The Government National Mortgage Association approved 35 issuer licenses last year and hopes to approve about the same this year, according to agency president Ted Tozer.

Is the Government National Mortgage Association actually making progress in clearing its backlog of issuer applications? Answer: It all depends on who you ask.

Fannie Mae bought just $52 billion of home mortgages from its seller/servicers in April, a 45% plunge from March, according to new figures released by the GSE. Freddie Mac bought $26 billion of loans, a 39% decline from March.

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau served official notice that it is seeking comment on a range of issues—including the cost of potential litigation—and whether debt-to-income ratios should be used to determine a borrower’s “ability to repay” a residential loan.

Deloitte says that assets controlled by the shadow banking system—including asset- and mortgage-backed securities—have declined by more than 50% in the last four years, to $9.53 trillion at Dec. 31.

There are redundant quality control measures used in the third-party origination process that might be resolved if market participants could overcome compliance concerns and trust issues and agree on a neutral, secure data platform or best practices, according to a recent industry discussion.

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau has decided to delay the issuance of a final ‘Qualified Mortgage’ rule until after the November 6 elections, industry officials told National Mortgage News.

The commercial mortgage-backed security delinquency rate reached an all-time high in May at 10.04%, up 24 basis points from the prior month.

Allied Irish Bank has signed HML to offer the U.K.’s first 48-hour "hot" standby servicing arrangement for the issuer's £437.6 million ($683 million) securitization of U.K. mortgage assets.

Wall Street investors are demanding new data and analytics to evaluate existing and new MBS deals.

Two recent and largely unrelated developments have renewed attention to two recurring post-downturn themes that persist even though the bubble’s bursting is receding further into the rear-view mirror, namely: The potential for heightened buyback sensitivities and for covered bonds to make more inroads domestically.

The nation’s megabanks are continuing to sit on their nonperforming residential loans, although some are currently out in the market with mid-sized packages.

A U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission no-action letter issued in response to a Royal Bank of Canada request among other things opens the door for U.S. dollar-denominated covered bonds’ inclusion in indices investors use to track returns, according to Fitch.

The latest sale includes $1.6 billion of collateralized debt obligations (CDOs) tied to home loans known as ‘Duke Funding High Grade I Ltd.’

In a recent presentation to investors Fortress Investment Group estimated that $4 trillion in mortgage servicing rights may change hands over the next few years, but MSR investors and others say that estimate is much too high.

The Federal Home Loan Banks stopped purchasing private-label MBS in 2008, but losses on those bad investments have been a major drag on earnings ever since. But that may be changing.

A pair of nonlisted real estate investment trusts with the same dealer/manager have modified their share repurchase programs to increase stockholder liquidity.

New regulations have, and are expected to continue to impact the commercial real estate mortgage servicing industry, while process redesign and technology implementations are helping organizations improve efficiency, expand offerings and in many cases, retain staff.