In the third quarter of 2013, Wells Fargo sold a mere $8.4 billion in residential mortgages to Freddie Mac, a 71.3 percent plunge in volume from the second quarter, and a figure that represents just 17 percent of what the nation’s largest lender sold to Fannie Mae. Analysts that closely follow Wells Fargo believe that the megabank’s switch in secondary market strategy was simply a matter of money, as securitizing through Fannie was more profitable than sending most of its business to Freddie, as it traditionally has. Moshe Orenbuch, an analyst and managing director at Credit Suisse, noted...

Since the summer, the regulator has been pondering reducing the current $417,000 maximum loan limit and the “high cost” limit of $625,500. At the earliest, a change could come by January.

How do you spell servicing relief? It all depends on who you ask. Meanwhile, First Guaranty Mortgage is entering the warehouse arena.

The low profile of the FHLBs, which has served the system so well in the past, has become a “sizable policy risk” as the relatively few people who will be directing housing finance reform know what the system does.

Clayton noted 907 compliance findings from its review. However, Fitch said the findings were deemed to be out of scope and waived by Fannie due to the limited scope of its post-close review for compliance.

Rumors abound about mortgage firms either closing or laying off staff. Meanwhile, Auction.com, known for selling troubled real estate for banks and other investors, is offering up a $600 million pool of performing multifamily mortgages.

Correspondents are an especially good source of purchase mortgages. During the third quarter, purchase mortgages accounted for over half (50.5 percent) of correspondent-originated loans securitized by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.

Mortgage banking officials tracking the issue believe that if the agency is going to lower Fannie Mae/Freddie Mac loan limits for 2014 it will need to codify those changes by mid- to late October to give lenders time to update their technology systems.

Officials at Fannie Mae said they learned from Freddie Mac when structuring their pending risk-sharing transaction, including getting the deal rated. Investors are generally impressed with the transactions and look forward to more. Fannie’s Connecticut Avenue Securities Series 2013-C01 is scheduled to close on Oct. 24, according to a presale report released late last week by Fitch Ratings. The higher of the two tranches offered for sale is set to receive a BBB- rating, the lowest investment grade rating available. Speaking at the ABS East conference produced by Information Management Network this week in Miami, Laurel Davis, a vice president at Fannie Mae, said...

The nation’s top court this week may have sent a subtle hint to the more than dozen big bank defendants being sued by the Federal Housing Finance Agency when it flatly declined to receive their petition to dismiss their cases, notes a legal expert. The 13 financial institutions – including Bank of America, Deutsche Bank, Goldman Sachs and JPMorgan Chase – sought to argue before the Supreme Court of the United States that the FHFA waited too long when it filed suit against the banks in 2011 over non-agency MBS the government-sponsored enterprises purchased prior to the 2008 financial crisis. SCOTUS said...