RMBS

Regulators took their first step this week toward drafting new rules that would require lenders to retain some risk before selling loans into the secondary market.

Industry veteran Tom Wind, who has headed such mortgage powerhouses as Chase Home Finance and Aurora Loan Services (ALS), has been named managing director of J.I. Kislak Mortgage, Miami Lakes, Fla.

The Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System issued a report yesterday on the potential effect of credit risk retention requirements on securitization.

The Brazilian Finance Ministry’s recent hike of the IOF tax on foreign investment into fixed income investments to 6% from 4% is bound to have some kind of impact on the appetite of overseas money for local securitization products. The increase comes after a 2 percentage point hike earlier this month.

The Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) started a review of several Federal Housing Administration (FHA) mortgage servicers during the summer, discovering what it calls "significant differences" in the way they handle defaulted borrowers in the loss mitigation process.

Issuer panelists at today's gathering called Covered Bonds — The Americas said that the sector has provided them with a good source of funding diversity.

Mortgage application activity declined in the week ending Oct. 15 as mortgage rates backed up, according to the Mortgage Bankers Association's (MBA) weekly report.

The housing crisis may now get as personal for bank executives as it has for individual homeowners.

Bank of America late Tuesday said it is "not responsible" for the "poor" performance of mortgages "as a result of a bad economy," and defended its role as a servicer on billions of dollars in outstanding home loans.

The £3.4 billion ($5.33 billion) U.K. prime RMBS master trust issue called Arkle 2010-2 was absorbed by the market quite quickly, with fairly little marketing.