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| A new government report indicates that two institutions are neck-and-neck in the race for the titles of biggest residential originator and biggest commercial originator.Wells Fargo & Co. originated $24.0 billion in residential first mortgages during January, according to a loan production table released yesterday by the U.S. Department of the Treasury. The table was part of an update on lending activity by U.S. institutions that sold preferred shares through the capital purchase program which was developed under the Troubled Asset Relief Program.
The San Francisco-based bank also funded $0.6 billion in home-equity lines-of-credit, bringing its total home loan production to $24.6 billion and making it the biggest residential lender in January. Wells Fargo & Co. was also the No. 1 originator during all of 2008, with $230.0 billion in volume. Bank of America Corp. trailed with $22.9 billion in first mortgage volume and $1.4 billion in HELOC activity. Bank of America Corp. was the third-biggest residential originator last year with $181.0 billion in production. JPMorgan Chase & Co. was next, with $9.6 billion in first-mortgage fundings and HELOC volume of $0.3 billion during January. JPMorgan was the second-biggest home lender in 2008 with $185.3 billion in volume. Citigroup Inc. followed, with $7.8 billion in January mortgage activity and $0.8 billion in HELOC business; then U.S. Bancorp, at $4.0 billion in mortgage originations and $0.3 billion in HELOC activity. Missing from the table was GMAC LLC, which reported in late December that it had converted to a bank-holding company and received $5 billion in TARP funds. Last year’s originations at subsidiary Residential Capital LLC were $55.1 billion — making it the sixth largest mortgage lender. “Mortgage origination volume rose significantly in January, as lower interest rates fueled a strong demand to refinance,” the Treasury stated. “The median percent change in mortgage refinancing was an increase of 110 percent from the December 2008 to January 2009.” The following table includes total first-mortgage and HELOC originations reported by the Treasury for January as well as production data for last year reported by MortgageDaily.com. In addition to ResCap, PHH Mortgage — which ranked No. 11 during 2008 with $33.9 billion in production — was missing from the Treasury’s data.
“Despite the worst financial crisis in decades, the survey of the top 21 recipients of government investment through the capital purchase program found that most institutions had higher originations across consumer lending categories than in December 2008,” the Treasury said. On the commercial mortgage side, BoA held a slight edge over its West Coast rival — with $3.91 billion in production during January. The total reflected existing account renewals and new commitments. Wells was No. 2 in January, with total commercial volume of $3.89 billion, followed by Regions, which had $1.73 billion in activity, and BB&T, where $1.63 billion in business was done. No. 5 was KeyCorp, which funded $1.25 billion in commercial real estate loans. An overall decline in commercial and industrial lending was partly attributed to lower demand from businesses that were focusing on preserving liquidity and strengthening balance sheets. Also impacting slowing activity were frozen securitization markets and a lack of commercial mortgage-backed securities activity. |
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