making reality look worse – Fannie, Freddie Losses May Hit U.S. – By NICK TIMIRAOS – The U.S. government’s move to deepen its ties to mortgage-finance giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac by agreeing to absorb unlimited losses for the next three years is igniting a debate over whether [...]

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Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce (CIBC) has priced its landmark U.S. dollar-denominated covered bond with initial guidance at about 30-32 basis points over mid-swaps, according to a story Jan. 26 from Canada’s Financial Post. It is estimated that CIBC’s funding cost for the bond — which has a three-year maturity — will be about [...]

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On the possibility of Fannie and Freddie going away, one clever rep wrote to me and asked, “Do we really need FNMA, FHA, and FHLMC when it is all government run anyway?  They could start a new entity named “Federally Regulated Committee to Normalize Mortgage Securities”, or “FRCNMS” – pronounced “FRICKEN [...]

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     +   Adjustable-Rate Mortgages Losing Ground – CARRIE BAY -  … An annual report on the ARM market published by Freddie Mac Tuesday shows adjustable-rate mortgages accounted for just 3 percent of all conventional home purchase loans in 2009. That’s the smallest piece of the pie for ARMs since [...]

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