As the New York Federal Reserve moves closer to completing the winding down of its Maiden Lane (ML) vehicles, investors face a falloff in inventory volumes. This poses a further challenge in this yield-starved environment.

Commercial banks, still busy with the business of tidying up their portfolios and shrinking balance sheets, are slowly getting back to small business lending. However, the void created by their long absence has been increasingly filled by both smaller regional banks and nonbank lenders. It's the latter that are driving securitization because it increases their access to funding, allowing them to grow lending volumes.

The ASF recently released a white paper entitled "Discussion of a Proposed Single Agency Security" that outlines the issues to be addressed in effectively merging the securities markets of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to reduce "TBA market inefficiencies." This column will discuss the implications of unresolved issues raised by the report.

By the end of this year, RMBS issuers keen on obtaining funding from the European Central Bank, as well as those already using these securities as collateral in sale and repurchase agreements, will need to input data on the underlying mortgages into the newly created European DataWarehouse, known pithily as ED.

Scheduled to launch later this year, the European DataWarehouse will, for the first time, house loan-level data on a wide range of loans backing the region's ABS. The European Central Bank is the information repository's biggest client and champion.

Securitization market participants welcomed Deutsche Annington's July 10 announcement of German Residential Asset Note Distributor's (GRAND) proposed loan restructuring.

With interest rates low and federal housing initiatives in full force, the July prepayment report, scheduled for release in August, is expected to show an increase in speeds.

Freddie Mac is extending its streamline refinancing program to mortgages with loan-to-value ratios of 80% or less, bringing its Home Affordable Refinancing Program in line with Fannie Mae’s.

Given that the subprime auto ABS market has rebounded in the last three years, Wells Fargo believes that the new-issue volume in the sector “should easily” exceed last year’s $12.6 billion.

Mortgage application activity was essentially flat in the week ending July 27, as a decline in purchase activity offset a slight 0.8% increase to roughly 5464 on the Refinance Index - its highest level since mid-April 2009, according to the Mortgage Bankers Association (MBA).

Maybe housing really is back. Standard & Poor's reported Tuesday morning that its 20-city house price index rose for

Ed DeMarco, acting director of the Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA), said Tuesday that struggling borrowers whose loans are owned by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac will not be allowed to wipe out part of their mortgages under a government program, defying pressure from the Obama administration and top Democratic lawmakers.