By NELSON D. SCHWARTZ
Published: February 23, 2012 New York Times
Bank of America said Thursday that it would no longer sell new mortgages to Fannie Mae, underscoring tensions in a fight between giants of the home loan market over billions in losses in the housing bubble.
The latest move represents a major escalation in a protracted legal battle over how many defaulted mortgages Bank of America will have to buy back from Fannie because the original loans had not conformed to proper underwriting standards, market experts said.
“In mortgage circles, it’s pretty big,” said Guy Cecala, publisher of Inside Mortgage Finance, a trade publication. “It would be fairly extreme for a small or midsized lender to do this, but for a major lender, it’s very extreme.”
As one of the large government-sponsored mortgage finance enterprises, Fannie Mae takes mortgage loans from banks and packages them into securities that can be sold to investors or held on their own balance sheet. Fannie Mae backs about 40 percent of all mortgages in the United States.
Bank of America was Fannie’s third-largest provider last year, according to Inside Mortgage Finance. The bank originated $156.1 billion in mortgages last year, of which $37.7 billion were sold to Fannie, the trade publication said.
Bank of America insisted its customers would not be hurt by the decision, and said it can make up for the loss of Fannie as a backer by turning to Freddie Mac or Ginnie Mae, other government-sponsored mortgage buyers; the private sector; and by deploying its huge balance sheet.
“This decision will not affect the credit available to our customers, and we will rely on other sources of liquidity to continue to ensure we are lending to our customers and supporting the housing market recovery,” said Lawrence Di Rita, a spokesman for Bank of America. He added that the bank would continue to participate in assisting homeowners, including through the federal government’s loan modification program.
Bank of America agreed in January 2011 to buy back $2.5 billion in soured mortgages from Fannie and Freddie, but that deal left the door open to future claims from Fannie. Bank of America also reached an $8.5 billion deal with private investors to cover repurchase claims last June, but that accord is the subject of another legal fight.
Bank of America does not break out how much it has faced in claims from each company, but it has recorded losses on $9.2 billion worth of loans made from 2004 to 2008 that were later acquired by Fannie and Freddie.
Mr. Cecala said that while consumers should not feel the effects of the move in terms of access to credit, the absence of Fannie Mae as a backer could make Bank of America’s mortgage terms and rates less competitive in the future. A spokesman for Fannie Mae declined to comment.
Bank of America revealed the decision in a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission on Thursday. The direct cause was the dispute over the repurchases, but it comes as Bank of America is reducing its overall size and streamlining its business, and shrinking its mortgage business in particular.
Meanwhile, Fannie and Freddie face questions over what role they will play in the housing market, as policy makers in Washington prepare to overhaul the government’s relationship with the mortgage industry.
Bank of America ranked as the nation’s second-largest originator of home loans for all of 2011, with an 11.6 percent market share, but by the fourth quarter it had slipped into fourth place behind Wells Fargo, JPMorgan Chase and Citigroup, according to Inside Mortgage Finance. Wells, in particular, has been an aggressive competitor, picking up much of the slack in the market and now accounting for one out of every four mortgage originations.
Bank of America, once the nation’s largest bank by assets, has been steadily shrinking its balance sheet, and now ranks second to JPMorgan Chase. Many of its problems stem from the disastrous 2008 decision to buy Countrywide Financial, a subprime mortgage lender that caused Bank of America to record more than $30 billion in losses.
Investors are concerned that Fannie and Freddie, along with private investors, will force Bank of America and other giant mortgage lenders to repurchase tens of billions in mortgages that later defaulted, arguing they were not made with adequate documentation or proof of income, or otherwise failed to conform to proper underwriting standards.
Bank of America and its competitors have argued that many homeowners defaulted because of unemployment, the weak economy and other factors, not errors in the origination process.
Still, repurchase fears weighed on Bank of America shares in particular last year, and at one point Bank of America’s stock fell below $5 a share. Its shares closed at $8.02 on Thursday, up 7 cents.
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