An increase in conventional lending products drove the upturn, but the overall reading of the Mortgage Bankers Association index still landed near the longtime low from late 2023.

Other servicing gains helped Mr. Cooper profit despite negative mark-to-market valuations and cyberattack costs that led to lower consecutive-quarter results.

The year-over-year gain was 1.3 percentage points higher in the most recent period compared with the third quarter last year, the National Association of Realtors found.

Only a few dozen mortgage firms could likely afford the $7 million ad for this year’s big game, a marketing veteran said.

Near the end of last week, the title of the daily mortgage rate article was “Rates Right in Line With Long-Term Lows, But That Could Change on Friday.”  Indeed, rates ended up jumping in a big way–the biggest in more than a year. There was no clairvoyance involved, nor was it a lucky guess.  In fact, the intention of the headline was to point out that rates could go big in EITHER direction.  It was not destined to be the case, necessarily.  All we knew is that we would receive one of the two most important monthly economic reports the following morning and that interest rates routinely react to any big surprises in that report. The report in question was the employment situation (aka “the jobs report”), and if you’ve read anything about mortgage rates in the past week, you’ve seen the damage.  The other of the two big reports is the Consumer Price Index (CPI).  That comes out this coming Tuesday morning and carries just as much potential for volatility (in EITHER direction).  To be clear, it’s not incredibly likely that rates would fall as much as they jumped last week, but a low CPI reading could make for a very good day for rates.  Conversely, a high CPI reading could send rates higher at a fast pace, but also probably not as fast as last Friday’s.  We have to say words like “probably” and “potential” because the reality depends on exactly how the data arrives. 

The Consumer Price Index (CPI) is the one thing we wait for after the jobs report comes out.  After CPI, the one thing becomes the next jobs report (and so on and so on…).  The jobs report came out last week.  CPI comes out next Tuesday.  So what’s up with CPI being in the news today?  Like many economic reports, CPI is seasonally adjusted.  If it weren’t, it would be much harder to interpret without running one’s own seasonal adjustments.  But seasonal patterns can change over time for so many reasons.  The adjustments stay more relevant if they’re periodically updated.  That update was published today and applied to PAST releases of CPI.  Next week’s release will be the most current release and a far more important event than today’s revisions (which ended up being a non-event).

Uneventful Ceiling Defense

On a day where 10yr Treasury yields bounced multiple times at the 4.19% technical level, and considering the recent relevance of that particular level, we might expect to find that the intraday trading story was interesting or exciting.  This could possibly be argued for the early morning trading surrounding the release of CPI seasonal revisions, but that played out in a matter of minutes and had nothing to do with 4.19%.  The rest of the day was spent grinding sideways just under that ceiling.  MBS did slightly better than Treasuries due to the monthly UMBS 30yr settlement process (not a reliable pro or con, but a pro this time around).

Econ Data / Events

Jobless Claims

218k vs 220k f’cast, 227k prev

Market Movement Recap

10:07 AM Volatility after CPI revisions, but actual selling around 9:20-9:30am ET.  Holding ground under the 4.19% ceiling, currently up 1.9bps at 4.177.  MBS are down 3 ticks (.09).

01:15 PM Off the weakest levels now.  MBS down only 3 ticks (.09).  10yr up 2.3bps at 4.181.

03:25 PM Slowly grinding toward less red levels.  MBS down only 2 ticks (.06) and 10yr up 1.9bps at 4.177.

Sometimes there is no shortcut when you want to make a lot of money. Speaking of making money, and creating wealth for clients, owning real estate continues to be a good investment. The National Association of Realtors tells us that more than 85 percent of metro markets registered home price increases in the fourth quarter of 2023. Its latest quarterly report reports that fifteen percent of the 221 tracked metro areas experienced double-digit price gains over the same period, up from 11 percent in the third quarter. In the lending world, according to Curinos, January 2024 funded mortgage volume increased 3 percent year over year but decreased 4 percent versus the previous month. The average 30-year conforming retail funded rate in January was 6.86%, -39bps lower than December and 47bps higher than the same month last year. Curinos sources a statistically significant data set directly from lenders to produce these benchmark figures. (Today’s Commentary podcast can be found here and this week’s is sponsored by Vesta, the new, modern Loan Origination System (LOS) which helps lenders reduce their costs to originate and improve their ability to integrate with new technologies in the ecosystem. Hear the second and final part of an interview between attorney Brian Levy and Robbie on life outside of mortgage.) Lender and Broker Software, Products, and Services Make your general ledger profitable and run your business more efficiently with Loan Vision and LV-PAM. Instead of “staying alive until ‘25”, with Loan Vision, a software built by the mortgage industry for the mortgage industry, you can “produce more in 24!” Customers on Loan Vision see improvements of 30%+ decrease in days to close the books, 20%+ reduction in accounting headcount, complete LOS to G/L automation, and improved reporting and visibility. Interested in learning how Loan Vision can help you run a more efficient and profitable company? Contact Carl Wooloff to schedule a call today.

The unanimous decision reinstated a jury verdict in favor of a plaintiff worked in support of the institution’s commercial mortgage-backed securities business.

The quarterly rise in late payments on Federal Housing Administration loans was more than five times the increase for home loans overall.