The number of loans repurchased by lenders from Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac fell sharply during the second quarter from the record level set during the first three months of 2013, according to a new Inside Mortgage Finance analysis of repurchase disclosures by the two government-sponsored enterprises. In filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission, the two GSEs reported a total of $2.81 billion of mortgage repurchases during the second quarter, down 78.7 percent from the first quarter of 2013. GSE buybacks hit a record $13.21 billion in the first three months of 2013 as Fannie and Bank of America resolved their dispute over legacy loans sold to the GSE by Countrywide Financial. The settlement also helped wipe out...[Includes one data chart]

Fannie Mae seller/servicers also can dodge the maintenance fee if they have $25 million in Fannie servicing or paid $5,000 in technology fees.

Besides Citi, a handful of large depositories are in the midst of wrapping up sizable MSR auctions this week, including offerings from Wells Fargo and Flagstar Bancorp.

Citadel Servicing CEO Dan Perl said "the phones are ringing like a son-of-a-gun" at his nonprime lending shop.

Loan officers, so far, have been spared the layoff carnage, but that may change depending on where volumes wind up.

The secondary market for mortgage servicing rights continues to spit out new offerings, especially in the bulk arena.

PHH saw its share price spike late last week after rumors spread that it may sell a large block of mortgage servicing rights.

Residential mortgage REITs held $327 billion of single-family MBS at the end of the second quarter, according to a new market analysis by Inside MBS & ABS.

Fannie Mae this week hired James Kittridge, a former executive from Barclays Capital, to manage its participation in the fledgling common securitization platform project with Freddie Mac. However, both Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac – and their regulator – continue to provide little in the way of public information on how the CSP project is progressing. The Federal Housing Finance Agency will not even confirm that it recently hired the search firm of Spencer Stuart to help find an executive to oversee work being performed by the government-sponsored enterprises and a core group of staffers at the regulator. The starting salary for the FHFA CSP post is...

It’s not a surprise that FHFA has been quiet about its not-overly popular state-level g-fee proposal, according to Robert Bostrom, a shareholder at the law firm of Greenberg Traurig and a former general counsel at Freddie Mac.