NAFCU President and CEO Fred Becker today hailed the introduction by Reps. Ed Royce, R-Calif., and Carolyn McCarthy, D-N.Y., of a credit union member business lending bill that seeks anew to facilitate an increase in the MBL cap to a maximum 27.5 percent of assets for eligible institutions.

DocVelocity Augments Capsilon's Sales and Support Capabilities; Capsilon to Assume Customer Relationships TROY, Mich. and SAN FRANCISCO, Feb. 14, 2013 /PRNewswire/ -- Flagstar Bancorp, Inc. (NYSE: FBC) has agreed to sell the assets and operations of DocVelocity, its document imaging business for mortgage lenders, to Capsilon, a provider of cloud-based document sharing, imaging and collaboration solutions for mortgage lenders. Capsilon developed much of the technology that DocVelocity has marketed and sold since 2007, and which Flagstar has used to provide paperless mortgage processing to its wholesale customers. Following the transaction, Flagstar will continue to use the DocVelocity ...

WASHINGTON (MarketWatch) -- Current "rather low" readings on inflation may give the Federal Reserve leeway to continue buying bonds and mortgage-related assets longer than otherwise would be the case, said James Bullard, president of the St. Louis Federal Reserve, on Thursday. The Fed's $85 billion per-month asset-purchase plan has no end date. The Fed has said only that it wants to see a substantial improvement in the labor-market outlook. Being more specific about what "substantial improvement" means may be a "bridge too far" for the Fed, Bullard said in a speech at Mississippi University. Bullard favors tapering purchases rather than bringing them to a sudden stop. Some Fed officials have said they think the purchases could end well before the end of the year.

Goldman Sachs economists forecast that residential investment-related employment growth should pick up this year and next.

WASHINGTON -- Financial Services Committee Chairman Jeb Hensarling released the following statement today after the Government Accountability Office (GAO) added the Federal Housing Administration (FHA) to its list of government programs identified as "high risk due to their greater vulnerability to fraud, waste, abuse and mismanagement or the need for transformation". FULL GAO REPORT (.pdf)                                                          "This reinforces everything our committee has been saying about the FHA for some time now - it is a high risk to taxpayers, it is a high risk to the mortgage insurance market and it represents a high risk to our economy.  "We know the FHA is broke and is quickly approaching bailout-broke. So, while it is troubling, it is not surprising that GAO would add FHA to their high risk list.  "For Americans to have a healthy economy, we must put the nation on a sustainable fiscal path. And to have a sustainable fiscal path, we must also have a sustainable housing finance system. Today's announcement from GAO underlines my grave fears that FHA, as it is operating today, is an impediment to both," said Chairman Hensarling.  The Financial Services Committee has held two hearings just this month to review the financial condition and the role of the FHA. These two hearings are part of an ongoing series the committee will hold throughout the year that focus on FHA and the need to create a sustainable mortgage finance system.  An actuarial report released by the Department of Housing and Urban Development in November revealed the FHA's single-family insurance fund, which insures more than $1 trillion worth of home...

Housing Industry Looks to Obama to Soften Mortgages Businessweek U.S. Realtors and mortgage bankers say they're hoping President Barack Obama's call for streamlining mortgage rules will lend new momentum to efforts to prevent imposing a strict minimum down payment for home loans. "Right now, overlapping ... and more »

Foreclosure Filings Drop to 6-Year Low on California Law Bloomberg U.S. foreclosure filings fell 28 percent last month from a year earlier to the lowest level since April 2007, as a new California law slowed first-time defaults in the most-populous state, according to RealtyTrac. Filings across the nation dropped 7 percent from ... and more »