Underwriting

While the overwhelming majority of Nationstar Mortgage Holdings' $4.9 billion in home loan originations in the third quarter were conventional loans, that will be changing soon if the company's chief executive officer has his way.

Former Rabobank trader Anthony Allen, found guilty for rigging a key financial benchmark, struck jurors in Manhattan as evasive, deceptive and "shaky," as one of them put it after delivering the verdict.

Fannie Mae was affected by the same derivatives accounting mismatch that led to Freddie Mac's first quarterly loss in four years. But its bulk and balance sheet provided enough cushion for the larger of the two government-sponsored enterprises to post a profit for the third quarter.

After years of plowing resources into compliance projects, mortgage lenders surveyed by National Mortgage News are foregrounding core business initiatives in their plans for the coming year. High on to-do lists are projects aimed at improving the customer experience and seizing new business opportunities.

New rules proposed by international banking regulators would severely reduce, and possibly eliminate, banks' profitability in trading bonds that finance everything from home loans and apartment mortgages to auto loans and student debt, according to JPMorgan Chase & Co.

Mortgage applications decreased 0.8% for the week ending Oct. 30 according to the Mortgage Bankers Association's weekly survey — an improvement from the 3.5% drop registered the week prior.

Five Oak Investment Corp, a real estate investment trust that manages a portfolio of agency and nonagency RMBS, is back with a second securitization this year, according to Kroll Bond Rating Agency.

What's old is new again, but lenders should heed lessons from the past when re-entering the second-lien originations market.

Though the deadline for compliance is more than two years away, lenders are already warning that they do not have enough time to comply with a new rule that requires institutions to report additional data to regulators on home loans.

The government-sponsored enterprise is working to rebuild partnerships with church organizations and housing financing agencies as part of a broader effort to make owning a home affordable for low- and moderate-income families.