Thanks to improvement at the Federal National Mortgage Association, agency issuance climbed last month. Business at the Government National Mortgage Association was mostly unchanged, while the Federal Home Loan Mortgage Corp. saw another decline.
Fixed-rate issuance of mortgage-backed securities at all three housing finance agencies was $119.561 billion in May, rising from $104.187 billion a month earlier. Last month’s activity was somewhat of a recovery from April, when volume sank 30 percent.
In May 2011, agency issuance amounted to $63.473 billion.
The data, provided by eMBS, indicated that $591.779 billion in fixed-rate MBS has been issued on behalf of the agencies during the first five months of this year.
Fannie Mae recovered from a steep drop in April, with fixed-rate MBS issuance jumping to $62.534 billion in May from $43.983 billion. Volume at the Washington, D.C.-based company more than doubled from May 2011 — when issuance amounted to just $26.345 billion.
From Jan. 1 through May 31, Fannie’s issuances totaled $294.890 billion.
There was little change in activity at Ginnie Mae, where issuances inched up to $32.596 billion last month from April’s $32.513 billion. But issuers of the government-owned corporation’s securities stepped up their activity from May 2011, when the total was $19.833 billion.
Year-to-date through the end of May, fixed-rate issuance at Ginnie was $141.641 billion.
The worst performance last month was delivered by Freddie Mac, where volume fell to $24.431 billion in May from $27.691 billion a month earlier. Still, like its counterparts, the McLean, Va.-based firm managed a nice gain over $17.295 billion in agency issuance during May of last year.
So far this year, Freddie’s fixed-rate issuances totaled $141.641 billion.
