The Institutional Risk Analyst

When Ray Dalio says to be afraid of the bond market, he is asking a question that belongs in the mid-1970s, when the dollar still competed with other currencies and US interest rates were actually affected by interest rates in other nations. But today, with many of the other industrial nations led by Japan, China and the EU literally drowning in public debt, the US is still the leader of the parade.

A more efficient mortgage backed securities market benefits everyone by lowering mortgage rates and making home ownership more affordable.

There is an old rule on Wall Street that industry sectors like airlines and auto manufacturers are trades rather than investments...

When you see a bank with more than 10% of total assets in MBS, that's a big red flag in our book.

When President Donald Trump says that interest rates are too high, he may not fully understand just how right he is about the cost of credit

Ginnie Mae would rather have issuers raise the NPV of the MSR in cash today than take the price risk of holding the whole MSR through time.

McCargo's actions and the fact that the case has not been dismissed in its entirety is very unhelpful given current market conditions.

The Basel III proposal reflects a view of financial risks facing US banks that is decades out of date and ignores market risk

The legal dispute between Ginnie Mae and Texas Capital Bank makes additional defaults by HECM lenders more likely...

The Biden Administration has no real strategy for addressing the growing stress in the market for government insured mortgages

Persistent talk about a 5.5% 30-year mortgage rate later this year is badly wrong as TBAs flip from 5.5% to 6% coupons for delivery in June

Are nonbank mortgage firms a risk to Ginnie Mae? Or is it really the other way around?

Our view is that the BKI purchase is a horrible deal for ICE shareholders, a value killer of epic proportions

Is 2023 the year of the Return of the Distressed Loan Trade?

It seems obvious that the reported book value metrics coming from many commercial banks, REITs and mortgage banks are a tad inflated...

Until the FOMC raises interest rates to more “normal” levels, we don’t expect actual volatility to decline.

The nightmare scenario in the government loan market is that FHA loan delinquency rises to the point where issuers become insolvent

The banks have left the government market. Now Ginnie Mae seems bound and determined to drive the IMBs out of government lending as well

Interest rates are starting to be very positive, and bank deposit rates are barely moving, so pretense of fintech as bank killer is over

Collateralized lending in the US was essentially impossible outside of banks from 1925 through the mid-1970s...