Monday, March 16, 2009

BofA Feels Bite of Move Into Mortgage-Backed Securities

Posted By C. Brown

As a home-mortgage lender, Bank of America Corp. avoided the excesses of many rivals during the housing boom. But an analysis of mortgage-backed securities sold to investors in 2007 by the Charlotte, N.C., bank shows its performance isn't nearly as impressive in that area.
For example, among 17 issuers of securities backed by adjustable-rate jumbo mortgages, Bank of America's BAFC series has performed the worst, with payments on about 16% of the underlying loans 60 days or more overdue, according to a report from Walter Schmidt and other analysts at FTN Financial Capital Markets. FTN is a unit of First Horizon National Corp., a regional bank based in Memphis, Tenn.

In comparison, about 7.6% of the underlying loans in similar securities from Wells Fargo & Co. were at least 60 days overdue, and J.P. Morgan Chase & Co.'s Chase unit posted a rate of 4.5%.
A Bank of America spokesman said that on average about one-third of the loans packaged into BAFC securities in 2007 were originated by Bank of America, with the rest purchased from other lenders.
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