Opinion

Fannie Hires New Risk Officer, What Does It Mean?

THIS JUST IN: John Nichols has left his job at BlackRock Financial, a firm which obviously has a future, and joined Fannie Mae as its chief risk officer for the capital markets division. Note: Nichols is not the chief risk officer for the company as a whole. That job belongs to Ken Phalen. We're told that Nichols had already been "on assignment" to Fannie, but now he's a full-time staffer. The question now begs: Why would someone leave a job at BlackRock to join Fannie, especially with the GOP in control of the House and likely to throw multiple daggers at the GSEs? "Nichols taking the job tells me that there's a belief that Fannie and Freddie are going to be around for quite some time," said one due diligence expert…

Earlier this year, was Citigroup contemplating exiting the residential mortgage space? We're told that management went through such an exercise, but decided to stay put. After all, in what other product line can you lend 1% money out at 4%?...

Meanwhile, we're told there is plenty of talk these days about a new servicing contract between seller/services and the GSEs. For full details see the Monday paper edition of National Mortgage News. Don't subscribe? Call 800-221-1809

DATA NOTICE: The end of the year is coming which means mortgage lenders, servicers and vendors are busy making plans for next year. But where's the market headed and which top 100 firms dominate the business of lending and servicing? All those answers are available in the Quarterly Data Report, and our MortgageStats.com products. For more info on both drop an e-mail to Deartra.Todd@SourceMedia.com. She's handing out free samples these days…

Are certain nonbank lenders dinging their loan officers if it takes too long to close a loan, thus extending the life of the warehouse line? (By "dinging" we mean taking money out of their commissions.) We're told that such a thing is happening, indeed. If you have any information on this topic drop me a line at Paul.Muolo@SourceMedia.com

Meanwhile, in a few weeks NMN will publish a special report on warehouse lending. For more information drop an e-mail to Bradley.Finkelstein@SourceMedia.com

Jeff Fred of LoanMarket.net said he's hiring these days. LoanMarket is an eBay-like website for companies and individuals that want to buy and sell loans—usually troubled home mortgages. Jeff says the hardest part of the business is explaining how the system works to novice investors but "once you explain it, they get it," he says…

Gosh, what ever happened to BigBidder.com?...

POLITICIAL COMMENTARY: The GOP won the House and it's going to be gridlock for two more years, and blah, blah, blah. I'm ready to yank the cable out of my TV already. I understand that Fox News is already planning a special on Mitt Romney and his first 100 days in office (presuming that he's a shoe-in for 2012). Of course, the Romney administration will tank after it deregulates the banks, and then Hillary Clinton will be in by 2016, but then she'll mess up, only to be followed by Haley Barbour. Oh, and Keith Olbermann has been suspended by MSNBC and who cares because I don't watch that show either. I read newspapers.

From our Wall Street reporter, Bonnie Sinnock: Even with quantitative easing in place, the extent to which borrowers respond to a given rate incentive may have peaked in the most recent prepayment report. See Bonnie's story on http://www.nationalmortgagenews.com.

PHH Corp., a top-10 mortgage lender and servicer, appears to have shielded itself better than most from an onslaught of requests to repurchase defective loans. In the past 18 months, the Mount Laurel, N.J., company has received requests to repurchase or indemnify $191 million of loans owned by private investors (out of a total of $11.5 billion it services for such investors). PHH has successfully defended 83% of those requests, the company said. That story comes courtesy of American Banker.

From the Miami newspapers: Hundreds of employees were laid off at the law offices of David J. Stern on Thursday, as the embattled company struggles amid the foreclosure document scandal...

DATA ANNOUNCEMENT: The new 3Q edition of the Quarterly Data Report will be out in a few weeks. As noted, our research staff is busy sending out surveys to lender/servicers. Keep in mind that the 1Q and 2Q editions of the QDR are still available. The QDR provides industrywide composite data on loan production and servicing and specific figures on the top 100, including wholesale. A new feature for the QDR is our ranking of the nation's top FHA lenders. If you're looking for jumbo production numbers try the Alternative Products Quarterly Data Report. For more info on both drop an e-mail to Deartra.Todd@SourceMedia.com...

CORRECTION: Last week I mistakenly wrote that Chuck Schumer was not running for the Senate in New York this year. I thought he was up for re-election in 2012. Well, I was wrong. Chuck ran and won, which allows me to repeat this joke: What's the most dangerous place in Washington? Answer: Getting between Chuck Schumer and a TV camera.

I'm on Twitter. On occasion I break a few items, provide links to National Mortgage News stories, and comment on the Mets new general manager.

THE LAST WORD: The Treasury is busy working on a "transition document" for Fannie and Freddie.

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