RMBS

JPMorgan Chase said Wednesday that it is halting 56,000 foreclosures in process, pending a review of whether employees properly signed and verified information in foreclosure documents.

An early draft of a stop-gap funding resolution shows that Congress is headed toward passing a nine-month extension of the maximum $729,750 loan limit for Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac and Federal Housing Administration (FHA) loans in high-cost areas.

BTIG, a broker-dealer partly owned by Goldman Sachs, is pushing into new markets by helping fixed-income investors buy and sell securities in developing countries, which some observers say have matured and now more closely resemble their trading partners in the Group of 7.

While Federal Reserve officials are not ruling out future MBS purchases, there are some good reasons why they decided in August to reinvest principal payments into Treasurys instead, and that may play into any quantitative easing plans going forward.

Mortgage bankers are making money hand-over-fist on their new originations these days, and profit margins continue to be fat thanks to a low cost of funds and the ability to heap on all sorts of fees.

The foreclosure process implemented by U.S. mortgage servicers might stall foreclosures in some states and lead to increased RMBS loss severities, according to Fitch Ratings.

Despite mortgage rates setting new record lows, refinancing activity declined in the week ending Sept. 24 by 1.6% to ~4287 — its fourth dip in as many weeks, according to the Mortgage Bankers Association.

The Treasury Department singled out the three largest banks — Bank of America Corp., JPMorgan Chase & Co. and Wells Fargo & Co. — for failing to properly solicit and consider homeowners for the government's loan modification program.

Congressman Dennis Cardoza (D., Calif.) plans to introduce a blanket modification effort for GSE loans that could see as many as 30 million U.S. mortgage borrowers refinance their mortgages at record low interest rates.

Yesterday Moody's Investors Service placed the ratings of 319 RMBS tranches of 114 deals serviced by GMAC on review for possible downgrade as a result of specific servicing concerns.