Loan Repurchases
By Carrie Bay | 05/09/2012
Fannie Mae said Wednesday that it brought in $2.7 billion dollars in net income during the first quarter of this year, and for the first time since it was seized by the government in September of 2008, the company does not need a draw of taxpayer funds from Treasury to get out of the red. Fannie Mae says its improving numbers can be traced to lower credit-related expenses as the decline in home prices slowed and the company shed some of its REO holdings.
Read More
By Carrie Bay | 05/03/2012
Freddie Mac reported net income of $577 million for the first quarter of 2012. That combined with $1.21 billion in unrealized gains on securities investments resulted in comprehensive income of $1.79 billion. The GSE's finances didn't sit in the black for very long, however. After a $1.8 billion dividend payment to its primary shareholder, the U.S. Treasury, Freddie's net worth was a deficit of $18 million. Looking at the GSE's loss mitigation numbers, short sales almost equaled the number of loan modifications during the first quarter.
Read More
By Esther Cho | 04/02/2012
J.P. Morgan recently announced the issuance of $132 million in commercial mortgage-backed securities (CMBS) backed by non-performing commercial real estate loans.
According to the Wall Street Journal, the issuance is first time since the late 1990s. Prior to the securitization, the assets were owned by Rialto Capital Management, a real estate investment management company focused on distressed asset investment, management, and workouts.
Read More
By Ed Delgado | 01/20/2012
The Federal Housing Administration (FHA) has announced new measures to strengthen standards for the lenders it works with - measures the agency says will help it better manage the risk that comes with insuring mortgages against default. The new regulations raise the bar in terms of lender performance when it comes to seriously delinquent and claim rates, and shores up the agency's processes for requiring lenders to cover losses from insurance claims paid on mortgages that involve fraud or don't meet FHA's underwriting guidelines.
Read More
By Carrie Bay | 01/17/2012
Citigroup's fourth-quarter results fell far short of analysts' expectations, despite a 40 percent drop in credit losses from the previous year. The company reported net income of $1.2 billion, or 38 cents per share, for the fourth quarter of 2011. Analysts were looking for 50 cents per share. Company officials told investors that legacy mortgage issues are the single largest source of risk facing the U.S. banking industry. Citi saw loan buybacks go up 80 percent in 2011 as it stockpiled reserves for mortgage litigation costs.
Read More
By Carrie Bay | 01/13/2012
JPMorgan Chase kicked off the earnings reporting season for major U.S. lenders on Friday with its announcement that the company earned a record profit of $19 billion for the 2011 fiscal year. The numbers still failed to meet analysts' expectations, and details of the earnings data show the company continues to struggle with legacy issues stemming from the housing downturn. The company doled out more than $3 billion in 2011 to cover legal proceedings related to its mortgage business.
Read More
By Krista Franks | 01/10/2012
Suspicious activity reports (SARs) involving fraud across the financial industry rose from 1.32 million in fiscal 2010 to 1.45 million in fiscal 2011, according to the latest annual report from the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN). FinCEN previously reported that SARs specifically related to mortgage fraud had risen 31 percent from the first quarter of 2010 to the first quarter of 2011. However, 86 percent of these reports concerned actions that took place more than two years prior.
Read More
By Krista Franks | 11/29/2011
The Office of the Inspector General for the Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA-OIG) submitted its semiannual report to Congress reviewing FHFA's actions from April 2011 through September 2011. The FHFA-OIG pointed out several positive developments over the six-month period, including an elimination of the "golden parachute" compensation packages often offered to terminated GSE executives. However, these were balanced by a list of areas in need of improvement, most notably that FHFA does not conduct its own reviews of critical operations.
Read More
By Krista Franks | 11/22/2011
A federal judge has ruled to allow the Delaware and New York attorneys general to pursue litigation in Bank of America's $8.5 billion settlement with mortgage investors. Bank of America reached the settlement agreement in June with Bank of New York Mellon, the trustee for the 530 mortgage-backed securities trusts in question. But the judge has ruled that there's more at stake than the financial interests of the few major investors involved in the settlement negotiations.
Read More
By Krista Franks Brock | 10/26/2011
Special servicers resolved $63.5 billion in distressed commercial mortgage-backed securities (CMBS) loans in the 18 months from January 2010 to June 2011, according to Fitch Ratings. This amount is more than three-fourths the amount resolved between 2007 and 2009. Modification is the most common resolution strategy for larger balance loans. Fitch reports that the recovery rate for CMBS loans resolved by special servicers has remained at or better than 86 percent since 2007.
Read More
