Servicing prices are likely to be flatter in 2023

Prices for mortgage servicing rights may have picked up compared to where they were during the typical December slowdown, but investors may find them more favorable than they did during the earlier in 2022. "The market has shifted to be more of a buyer's market," said Nick Smith, managing partner and CEO of servicing investor Rice Park Capital. Not everyone agrees that the buy-side has the upper hand in today's market, but generally experts acknowledge that 2023 has kicked off with prices below the historic highs seen at the start of last year.

READ MORE: Servicing prices are likely to be flatter in 2023

Rocket Mortgage cuts some marketing roles. Are more layoffs coming?

Rocket Mortgage "reorganized" its marketing team last week, cutting 20 employees. A Rocket spokesperson confirmed the marketing layoffs, but did not elaborate any further. According to a former employee and to LinkedIn posts, the lender handed out pink slips in December and had a 10% personnel reduction in the summer.? The Rocket spokesperson said that these layoffs did not occur. A source claims that Rocket Mortgage is in the process of implementing another 10% reduction across the company in January and said names of low-performing employees were submitted in November. Rocket's spokesperson denied that such an initiative exists.

MISMO taking servicing transfer criteria to next step in 2023

The group said it will be able to rededicate itself to some of its other priorities now that it's released the latest update to its Reference Model Version 3.6, an effort former MISMO President Seth Appleton described in an introductory letter to its 2022 annual report as "foundational to the way market participants exchange information" through "data, systems and technology platforms." In addition to making more headway on standardized datasets aimed at easing friction in transfers with a focus on lender to closing partner communications, MISMO's priorities for the coming year include work designed to improve efficiency and scalability in the private label and agency mortgage-backed securities markets.?

Lender says rival stole trade secrets, data breach followed

Sturbridge, Massachusetts-based Northpoint Mortgage is accusing three Integrity Mortgage employees of breach of contract in the suit filed last week in the U.S. District Court for the District of Maine. The workers allegedly switched companies in late November and took from Northpoint a large amount of customer information. Northpoint on Dec. 21 also notified 131 customers last month of a data breach incident that occurred around the time of the employee departures, according to a filing with the Office of the Maine Attorney General. An unidentified mortgage loan originator exported client data including Social Security numbers to a lender at which they intended to take employment, the letter said.

Powell: Nonbanks need structural reforms, not Fed backstop

Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell said Tuesday that what big banks were to the 2008 financial crisis, nonbank financial institutions are to the pandemic era — but he drew the line on how far to carry that comparison. "What the pandemic revealed were weaknesses in the nonbank financial sector, much as the global financial crisis revealed those weaknesses in the big banks and large large financial market utilities," Powell said. "There's a lot of effort going into and has been in what do you do about money market funds, what do you do about the Treasury market?"? Powell's remarks came during a question-and-answer session at a symposium on central banking hosted at the Sveriges Riksbank, Sweden's central bank.

Silvergate Bank loaded up on $4.3 billion in Home Loan bank advances

When depositors began pulling money out of Silvergate Capital Corp. following the collapse of the cryptocurrency exchange FTX, the California bank shored up its liquidity by tapping a quasi-government agency not typically known as a lender of last resort. Silvergate received $4.3 billion from the Federal Home Loan Bank of San Francisco late last year, company filings show. The billions in liquidity provided by the FHLB in the fourth quarter alone helped La Jolla, Calif.,-based Silvergate stave off a further run on deposits. The lifeline that Silvergate got from the Home Loan Bank System shows one way in which the crypto industry has managed to find its way into the mainstream banking system.?

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