Finance

Former Fannie Mae CEO Daniel Mudd, who was named last month in a mortgage-related Securities and Exchange Commission fraud suit, has officially resigned from publicly traded investment manager Fortress Investment Group and its board, ending a leave of absence.

Citigroup will no longer purchase "medium or high-risk" loans that could result in buyback requests from Fannie Mae or Freddie Mac, in the bank's latest effort to improve the quality of mortgages it buys from correspondent lenders, according to an internal memo obtained by ASR sister publication American Banker.

President Obama's State of the Union address included a section on refinancing initiatives that will strike a chord with mortgage investors, a Barclays Capital report said.

Realogy Corp. plans to issue roughly $593 million of senior secured first lien notes due 2020 and around $325 million of senior secured notes due 2020 in a private placement.

With both refinancing and purchase activity lower, mortgage application activity declined 5.0% in the week ending Jan. 20.

Dutch mortgage originator Obvion yesterday announced the first Dutch RMBS of the year, Storm 2012-I.

It would cost Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac almost $100 billion to write down the principal on the underwater loans they control to current market values, according to a new estimate released by the Federal Housing Finance Agency.

The state attorney general leading settlement talks with the country's top mortgage servicers batted down speculation Monday that a deal had been reached.

RIFCO National Auto Finance Corp. has received a new, $20 million securitization facility through Aviator Trust.

Panelists on the credit card panel at ASF 2012 said that on a relative value basis the asset class has performed well, although it has seen some recent technical dislocation.

With the whole market still unsure of when home prices will hit rock bottom, investors remain wary of the private-label RMBS market.

Although there are channels of liquidity in the securitization market such as autos and CLOs, areas of dislocation remain because of regulatory uncertainty, according to panelists at ASF 2012 being held in Las Vegas this week.

In his welcome address at the American Securitization Forum’s (ASF) ASF 2012, Ralph Daloisio, managing director at Natixis, referred back to 2011 as “the year of revival.”

A regulatory proposal to require a minimum downpayment of 20% on 'qualified residential mortgages' will make it more expensive for first-time homebuyers to obtain private mortgages, according to the Mortgage Bankers Association.

DataQuick, a provider of real estate information solutions, today released RiskFinder Distress at ASF 2012.

According to ASR sister publication National Mortgage News, reports have surfaced regarding two top 10 ranked banks that are working on Jumbo deals for later in the year.

In a press conference held last week, Credit Suisse analysts said that the rampant use of principal forgiveness is a dangerous path because it promotes moral hazard.

VantageScore Solutions has stated that 46 investors, who run the gamut, are now using its consumer credit score model in their risk and pricing models.

Data provider CoreLogic has released an enhanced version of its RiskModel, which is a commercial analytics application utilized by the major banks and regulators to project future RMBS prepayments, defaults, losses and cash flows.

The Federal Reserve Bank of New York (FRBNY) resumed sales from its Maiden Lane II portfolio last week to strong investor interest, which should serve as a positive across the scope of structured finance, according to Deutsche Bank Securities analysts.