MORTGAGE BACKED SECURITIES 2.0 – PART ONE

Twice in the same week two entities published their recommendations on a new mortgage securitization process that would turn mortgages into tradable securities. Their motivation is to ensure that lending institutions are able to access the capital markets.

The need for a reset to MBS 2.0 is that the agencies responsible for purchasing and securitizing mortgages issued by lending institutions, Federal Home Loan Mortgage Association (FHLMC) and Federal National Mortgage Association (FNMA) were absorbed by the federal government. This action was in response to the credit crisis, increasing late payments and growing defaults by homeowners holding mortgages securitized by FHLMC and FNMA. Both agencies, known government sponsored enterprises (GSE), were public companies owned by shareholders before being taken over by the federal government.

Prior to the credit crisis the role of these agencies was to purchase qualifying mortgages, turn the mortgages into securities, and guarantee the timely payment of principal and interest, which were sold to investment banks who in turn sold them to investors. This process was established in the late 1960’s and was designed to provider lending institutions with a way to move the mortgages off their books and recapture the capital lend to home buyers.

Congress and the Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA) are struggling with finding a system to improve market liquidity and address the potential risks causing market disruptions. The ultimate solution will come from the federal government; particular focus will be on correcting some of the shortcomings of the original model, such as:

·        Implicit guarantee that the federal government would back the two GSE in the event of a crisis. This certainly was true……

·        Marginal impact on low to moderate income home buyers

·        Conflicts in regulations and between public and private objectives

A new securitization model is a critical step in the recovery and at a minimum, must ensure

·           Consistent, nationwide supply of mortgage financing for residential mortgages to qualified home buyers

·           Assistance to low and moderate income homebuyers, i.e. subsidized mortgages

As I wrote in an earlier blog, the ideal response to this opportunity will be a result of a collaborative effort between Congress, FHFA and representatives from the Capital Market. This mix of interests will ensure that each is represented and that the model will be a “best practice” approach to the stated objectives. At this point the following are some of the broad principles that should be addressed:

·        Securitization model that combines a federal government and private industry guarantee that timely principal and interest payments will be paid to investors on qualified mortgages

·        Transparency on the underlying mortgages in any securitized pools or tranches sold to investors

·        Investment grade rating on the securitized pools or tranches

I will review the recommendations offered and explore this topic further in another blog. Meanwhile, let me know your thoughts regarding..

What is your opinion about this?

Your ideas on the new securitization model?

Are there other viable alternatives available?

CLEARING ENTITIES – WHEN ARE THERE TOO MANY?

It seems that every week there’s an announcement of a new clearing entity supporting a market or product. Clearing is critical and provides safety and risk mitigation for market participants. But I wonder if there can be too much of a good thing?

Granted, clearing is a basic requirement of a sound financial services industry, and should address trade matching, collection of initial and variation margin and the clearing entity acting as the Central CounterParty. But is forming a new clearing entity the most effective approach?

In a market without a clearing entity, one is needed to provide critical services. This often requires regulatory changes, perhaps on a national scale, to begin the process. The local infrastructure must be in a position to support this process. This includes funding and contributing the expertise to define the processing and control functions. This is a heavy burden for an emerging or pre-emerging market to undertake.

Perhaps leveraging the expertise of an existing clearing organization, rather than creating a new entity, is a better alternative. This would permit clearing services to be made available faster and potentially with less pain and expense usually associated with forming a new entity. The potential benefits of this approach are considerable as it would reduce the costs associated with development and encourage the use of clearing in new markets.

Further along this line, I question why new clearing entities are being formed in markets where there is an existing entity already providing clearing services.  Are clearing services for one product substantially different from another product?  Are there benefits of using an existing platform?

If there are legislative or regulatory issues that demand a new entity, the industry should appeal this situation as it results in a fragmented clearing process. Additionally it requires firms to join multiple entities, support redundant interfaces and holding positions and balances across multiple entities all which results in increased costs.

Perhaps some products can’t be co-mingled or require unique processing streams and / or reporting.  Or segmentation may be required to mitigate associated risks. This can be addressed via a holding company structure where different processing streams within a clearing entity would maintain the required segmentation.

The old approach of “cloning” an existing infrastructure, to support a new requirement, has been the “go to” approach for financial services firms for far too long. As seen many times, this seemingly simple approach is costly in the long run with multiple interfaces, maintenance of different but similar applications and processing multiple processing streams.

Once in-place these cloned systems are almost impossible to replace or eliminate due to the ever evolving demands for new products, faster processing or new markets.

Fewer clearing entities will flatten the landscape and reduce fragmented processing streams. It will also support cross-margining and improved collateral management. In the future fewer clearing entities will ease the transition to global interfaces among clearing entities.

So, when will we learn from the hard lessons and modify our approach to the never-

ending demands of the industry?

What is your opinion about this?

           Are there other viable approaches available?

                 How many clearing entities memberships does your firm have?

THE 20% DOWN PAYMENT ON HOME PURCHASES, PERHAPS A PART OF THE PAST?

The SEC recently redrew their objection to softening of new proposed mortgage regulations. Instead they reached a compromise to re-evaluate, and potentially adjust the rule, two years after the effective date and then every five years afterward.

The softening, at this point, includes elimination of the down payment and the requirement for lenders to retain 5% of a loan’s risk once it has been sold to investors. This is a dramatic change from the standards discussed as recently as 2011.

The impetus for these changes is to improve the housing markets which many in housing industry, as well as affordable housing groups and regulators believe is being hampered by the current down payment requirement.

Home buyers were not the only, or even primary, reason for the credit crisis. But they certainly contributed to the enormity of the situation via default on making their mortgage payment.

Is elimination of the down payment an appropriate response to a weak housing market? Will it weaken a home buyer’s commitment to pay the mortgage? Will defaults increase over time? At the same time is two years too long to judge the success or failure of this change? Perhaps we should track payment history to ensure that we avoid mini-crises.

This is another step in modifying the Dodd Frank Act (DFA) which is still evolving. At the same time Congress is still discussing the future role of FNMA and FHLMC. And now, we are considering eliminating a major part the mortgage qualification requirement?

Addressing the weaknesses in the housing market is critical to the financial recovery. But deciding which entity will guarantee repayment to investors, and how the guarantee will work is critical to investors as well.  

The bottom line is that investors provide the flow of capital to lenders to ensure that there are competitive mortgage to homebuyers. As such Mortgage Backed Securities (MBS) must provide a level of safety to investors so that they will remain attractive to investors. 

         Is this a positive change?

                 What other changes should be made at this time?

                             Or, should we be maintain the traditional 20% down payment?

CONSOLIDATED AUDIT TRAIL (CAT) – A REAL OPPORTUNITY

The Securities Exchange Commission (SEC) Rule 613 requires the timely collection of securities transaction executed in US markets.  In addition to the SEC, CAT is being created with the active collaboration of the registered exchanges and FINRA which are commonly known as Self Regulatory Organizations (SRO). The first step focuses on the reporting of US National Market Securities (NMS), which includes listed equities and options.

Though a driver of this effort is the “Flash Crash of 2010” I believe that it reflects the regulators realization that they need to be more proactive in gathering timely data on all transactions flowing through the US infrastructure. Logically they are starting with trade data, which are currently dispersed across multiple markets. There are a still number of open issues that remain to be addressed by the regulators but I am confident that the other participant’s interests and concerns will be addressed to the benefit of the industry.

Though this effort requires substantial efforts to develop and implement, it is a real opportunity to bring the industry into the 21^st century. In addition it should provide an opportunity to sunset or eliminate various trade reporting systems that provide similar data to specific regulators. Also, I believe that this data collected by a central source may, in the future, provide other benefits to the industry as well.

            Do you believe that there is real value in this new rule?

                        If so, what are the benefits? If not, why not?

                                    If not, what the alternatives to meeting the regulatory needs?

SUPERVISORY COLLEGES FOR INTERNATIONAL CREDIT RATING AGENCIES

These organizations were established as a result of recommendations that the International Organization of Securities Commissions (IOSCO) made in their final report published in July 2013.  Supervisory Colleges for International Credit Rating Agencies creates a mechanism for sharing and discussing information regarding:

• Compliance with local or regional laws and regulations
• Implementation of, and adherence to, the IOSCO Code of Conduct for CRA
• Establishment and operation of rating models

•  Methodologies, internal controls, procedures to manage conflicts of interest
• Procedures for handling material non-public information
• With the goal of promoting better understanding of the risks faced or posed by international CRA and how relevant supervisors are addressing these risks

One lesson learned, was that credit rating agencies face conflicts. The Supervisory Colleges are a creative approach to avoiding similar missteps.

The colleges for S&P and Moody’s will be chaired by the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) and the college for Fitch will be chaired by the European Securities Markets Authority (ESMA. The SEC

              What’s your opinion about the need for supervision of credit rating agencies?

     Is this an appropriate response?

What are the critical best practices for the CRA?