Finance

The Mortgage Bankers Association (MBA) is supporting a Senate bill to streamline the Home Affordable Refinancing Program (HARP) relieving lenders of repurchase risk when they refinance underwater GSE borrowers.

Morgan Stanley priced a $622 million CLO for Oak Hill Advisors, according to a person familiar with the transaction.

The potential interest rate increase affecting new student loans originated via the government direct lending program will not affect existing FFELP SLABS deals, according to an emailed note from Standard & Poor's this morning.

When most major banks reach the end of the road in their efforts to collect on defaulted credit card accounts, they often sell rights to the soured loans to debt collectors for pennies on the dollar. Those pennies can add up to tens of millions in dollars in revenue for a large card issuer, but American Express (Amex) and USAA have long left that money on the table.

The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) late Tuesday reached a settlement with H&R Block subsidiary Option One Mortgage Corp. (OOMC), over charges that the now-defunct subprime lender misled investors that bought some of the firm’s MBS.

The CMBS new-issue pipeline is still growing. This week adds a new $1.4 billion single-loan deal backed by the Ala Moana Center mall in Honolulu, Hawaii.

The national delinquency rate continued its downward slide in 2012, falling to just over 7% at March 31, down 6% from the month prior, according to new figures compiled by Lender Processing Services (LPS) for its First Look Mortgage Monitor report.

After coming to grips with the dimensions of two critically important and related mortgage rules, federal regulators have decided that one should be finalized before the other: the qualified mortgage (QM) test.As result, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) will go first and finalize the QM rule, ultimately determining which loans are safe enough for consumers while shielding lenders from litigation provided they adhere to predetermined underwriting standards.

While mortgage rates declined to their lowest levels in the Mortgage Bankers Association's (MBA) survey history for the week ending April 20, refinancing activity did not see a corresponding increase.

The Supreme Court of the State of New York held a hearing on the $8.5 billion Countrywide Financial Corp. settlement case this afternoon.

The Federal Reserve Bank of New York set a Thursday deadline for all bids on the MAX CDO holdings of its Maiden Lane III portfolio.

The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has charged credit rating agency Egan-Jones Ratings Co. (EJR) and its owner and president Sean Egan for material misrepresentations and omissions in their July 2008 application to register as a Nationally Recognized Statistical Rating Organization (NRSRO) for ABS and government securities issuers.

Standard & Poor's reported Tuesday morning that home prices fell in February for the sixth consecutive month to the lowest level since 2002.

Fitch Ratings today released a report looking at the global exposure to refinancing risk in the structured finance and covered bonds markets.

The past is coming back to haunt former Fannie Mae chief executive James A. Johnson.

A $20 billion package of residential mortgage servicing rights being offered by Bank of America has yet to trade even though the bidding ended about two weeks ago, according to investment bankers familiar with the deal.

Don Curtis, vice president of business development for Carrrington Mortgage Services, Santa Ana, Calif., has left the company.

Price guidance a new $414 million CLO to be managed by Sankaty Advisors has emerged in line with other recent transactions, according to two people familiar with the deal.

Bearish technicals around the Federal Reserve's potential asset sales out of its Maiden Lane III portfolio are still weighing on the CMBS market, according to JPMorgan Securities analysts in their most recent weekly report.

Sterling covered bond volume has been quite high beginning in 2012. Public placement volumes are already more than the levels seen in any previous year, Moody's Investors Service said in a new special comment published today.