Despite an increase in securitizations at Fannie Mae, overall issuance of agency mortgage-backed securities fell in the final month of 2017. Annual activity also eased.
Between Fannie,
Freddie Mac and Ginnie Mae, there were $107.220 billion in fixed-rate MBS issued during December. That was a 6 percent decline from the preceding month.
The drop was far month substantial compared to the final month of 2016, when $156.750 billion in MBS were issued on behalf of the trio of housing finance agencies.
The data were reported to Mortgage Daily by eMBS, a provider of data and analytics to MBS market participants.
For all of 2017, agency issuance amounted to $1.2756 trillion, falling from $1.4508 trillion in 2016.
Last month’s biggest decline was at the Federal Home Loan Mortgage Corp., where activity fell 19 percent from November to $29.563 billion.
The McLean, Virginia-based firm’s issuance dropped 26 percent versus the same month in 2016.
Freddie’s fixed-rate MBS issuance during the 12 months ended
Dec. 31, 2017, was $335.825 billion, retreating from $382.601 billion the prior year.
A 5 percent decline left issuance on behalf of the Government National Mortgage Association at $34.250 billion. Ginnie’s issuance was down by a quarter from December 2016.
Full-year 2017 issuance at government-owned Ginnie decreased to $438.134 billion from $493.624 billion one year earlier.
Only the Federal national Mortgage Association experienced a month-over-month increase: 5 percent to $43.407 billion. But the secondary lender had the largest year-over-year decline: 39 percent.
Washington-based Fannie’s issuance totaled $501.672 billion for all 12 months of last year, diminishing from $574.611 billion in 2016.
