The Institutional Risk Analyst

Does the Trump White House understand that the professional staff of the GSEs are preparing to roll out yet another capital increase for the residential housing market in 2025? Does Director Pulte understand that the changes are being advanced by the staffs of the GSEs in his name and with his apparent support? We suspect that the answer is no.

If JPM, PFSI or UWMC want to pay the government to wrap conventional MBS in a “AA+” sovereign rating, why should the Treasury say no?

Our Bank Top 10 and Top 25 indices continue to outperform the industry benchmarks, but the broader samples show growing financial stress

S&P was the first to call out the growing lack of fiscal discipline in Washington, downgrading Uncle Sam in 2011

Bottom line, when a bank seems to be doing much better than other banks, there is usually a reason and that reason is almost always bad

Back in 2008, the FOMC opened the proverbial floodgates, pushing interest rates down to near zero and ushering in a bull market in both commercial and residential real estate starting in 2012. To give you a sense of just how far up the FOMC has manipulated home prices, the chart below shows loss given default (LGD) for the $2.5 trillion in bank-owned 1-4 family mortgages.

October 23, 2018 | This past week, readers of The Institutional Risk Analyst awoke to see that banking exemplar Bank of the Ozarks (OZK) had taken a loss on two legacy loans on regional mall properties in the Carolinas. First and foremost, this event shows that commercial real estate many parts of the US have still not recovered from the 2008 bust. Bank OZK, as it is now known since shedding its bank holding company, had previously reserved for the write-down. Our friends a