Secondary markets

Issuance of securitizations backed by these loans is becoming more dependable, and Fannie will need more mortgages that finance newly-built energy-efficient homes to keep it going.

The transaction consisting of $24 million in securitized Ginnie pools followed a 265% jump in broader industry eNote registrations last year.

Upcoming changes to underwriting regulations, as well as the end of the QM patch, in addition to growing home values, all add up for this market to have a good year.

While some industry forecasts predicted origination volumes would fall 7% quarter-to-quarter in 4Q, early earnings numbers from Wells Fargo, JPMorgan Chase, Citi and PNC Bank show they were down just 3% when purchased loans are excluded.

Industry watchers make their wildest guesses (more or less) about developments in real estate finance that could rock the industry in the upcoming months.

Michael Gramins, who a jury convicted in 2017, was among more than a half-dozen traders charged by federal prosecutors in Connecticut with misrepresenting the prices of mortgage-backed securities to clients in order to increase their firm’s profits and their bonuses.

Last year, smaller lenders were put at a slight disadvantage in terms of what they were charged in guarantee fees when they sold loans for cash.

The problem in the sector boils down to a lack of portability of data, whether it’s digital or contained in documents, that can be trusted between parties, LoanLogics Chief Product Officer Dave Parker argues.

The average per-loan profit margin remains incredibly strong, but the share of senior executives expecting it to fall has risen markedly.

Whether Ginnie issuance increases in the future may depend in part on the extent to which the Biden administration wishes to tap the FHA to promote affordable housing and homeownership.

If CMBS litigation picks up in earnest in the aftermath of the pandemic, lessons gleaned from over a decade of RMBS litigation could pay dividends, Bilzen Sumberg lawyers Philip Stein and Kenneth Duvall say.

The money lenders are making on each home loan hit another survey-record high in the third quarter, but it may not be quite as high going forward.

Even government-sponsored enterprise loans, which have seen forbearance rates drop for 24 weeks in a row, saw a slight uptick.

Experts in the field predict how some aspects of the market will develop in the coming year.

The Structured Finance Association fears Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin may release the government-sponsored enterprises from conservatorship ahead of the change in administration, and that doing so could disrupt the mortgage-backed securities market.

To truly manage risk, banks must invest in more sophisticated modeling, reporting and analytics to track market movements and ultimately maximize profitability, Vice Capital Markets’ Christopher Bennett says.

The Term Asset-Backed Securities Loan Facility was brought back to inject $100 billion into the pandemic-battered economy, but only a fraction has been disbursed. Yet experts, pointing to its calming effects on markets, recommend that it be extended into next year.

Lenders also increased jumbo product availability as well as rolling out new SOFR-indexed ARMs.

There have been several extensions of the policy since it was put into place as a way to sustain originations amid a wave of forbearance allocated to borrowers with government-related loans.

The sector’s leaders are hoping for better in 2021, while not forgetting lessons learned about the market’s risks in 2020.