Risk management

Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac announced this week a revised selling representation and warranty framework at the direction of their regulator, the Federal Housing Finance Agency.

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau warned lenders Thursday to avoid marketing services agreements where payment for advertising is really just disguising kickbacks.

Bank of America is getting some more mileage out of its Supreme Court victory in June.

The clash between the Department of Housing and Urban Development and its inspector general over down payment assistance programs run by state or local housing finance agencies continues to heat up.

Despite their major push to overhaul the housing finance market last Congress, Sens. Bob Corker, R-Tenn., and Mark Warner, D-Va., offered little optimism Tuesday that structural reform is on its way anytime soon.

The Department of Housing and Urban Development launched a new ethics program that will support whistleblower, ombudsman and hotline initiatives.

An initiative underway at Freddie Mac seeks to integrate new and existing technology to create a comprehensive suite of quality control tools designed to help lenders manage their mortgage repurchase risks.

Rebecca Mairone scarcely deserves a mention in the annals of finance, except for this: She's the only executive of a major U.S. mortgage lender found liable for her part in the 2008 financial crisis.

Ginnie Mae's plans to beef up oversight in response to the growth of nonbank issuers in its ranks will emphasize deeper analysis of firms' capital and liquidity positions rather than requiring issuers to maintain larger cash reserves.

Freddie Mac has taken out another reinsurance policy that transfers the risk that mortgages it insures will default.

It's hard to decide which is more surprising: that the largest U.S. bank has almost abandoned the business of making home loans insured by the Federal Housing Administration, that lots of big banks could be right behind it, or that the FHA might not even need to care.

Fannie Mae has completed a credit risk sharing transaction that transfers the actual losses on mortgages it insures — to reinsurers.

Lenders that allow borrowers to shop for third-party settlement services face new liability, as the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau's integrated mortgage disclosure rules will let borrowers sue over problems with vendor lists.

A recent uptick in mortgage application defects might be reversing, according to First American Financial.

GOP presidential contender Jeb Bush unveiled a plan to reform the regulatory process, including at agencies like the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau.

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau's method for detecting disparate impact discrimination can overestimate potential bias, resulting in higher payments for lenders cited by the agency, according to internal CFPB documents.

Benjamin Solomon, Deutsche Bank AG's former global head of securitized-product trading, accused the company in a lawsuit of firing him on frivolous and unjust grounds amid an industry focus on supervisors’ responsibilities.

The Securities and Exchange Commission has settled with Thomas Lund, the former head of Fannie Mae's single-family lending unit, for $10,000, according to news reports.

Although new HMDA data shows no negative effects from CFPB mortgage rules that went into effect last year, industry representatives argue it isn't showing the full picture.

While Congress has been unable to pass housing finance reform, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac have done a good job of adhering to some of the spirit of recent bipartisan legislation, according to Mark Zandi, chief economist at Moody's Analytics.