Fannie disclosed the single-security “may adversely affect our financial results and contribute to declines in the liquidity or market value of our MBS.”
Packaging the loans into a non-agency MBS suggests that Flagstar expects better execution in the non-agency market than from delivering the mortgages to Fannie Mae or Freddie Mac.
GSE earnings bounced back to a profitable status, as expected, in the first quarter, with Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac reporting a combined $7.2 billion profit. That number is up from the $9.4 billion earnings hit the GSEs took last quarter due to tax reform that went into effect in December 2017. [Includes one chart.]
Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac are in their 10th year of conservatorship and GSE shareholders rights group, Investors Unite, complained about reform still being in limbo. “No one in Washington has answers to fundamental questions about the future of affordable housing, the 30-year mortgage, and basic rights of shareholders,” said IU. Yet, the group noted that the GSEs continue to funnel their earnings to the Treasury Department, per the terms of the net worth sweep. In June, Fannie expects to pay Treasury a $938 million dividend payment.However, IU said the GSEs could be at risk for another taxpayer-funded bailout as long as the Trump administration delays needed reform “and allows the Obama Treasury Department’s net-worth sweep to remain in place.”