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[ad_1] Share Market News Today | Sensex, Nifty, Share Prices LIVE: Indian equity markets opened on a positive note amid strong global cues on Wendesday. Sensex was up 380.57 points or 0.63% at 60997.46, and the Nifty was up 111 points or 0.61% at 18166.80. Hindalco Industries, JSW Steel, Coal India, Tata Steel and Sun Pharma were among major gainers in the Nifty pack. In the broader market, the BSE MidCap and SmallCap indices were up 0.4 and 0.6 per cent, respectively. All sectoral indices were trading in positive territory, with highest gains seen in metals and realty. Share price of Infosys rose, while that of TCS and Wipro dipped ahead of Q3 earnings today. Global cues were positive as Asian markets were trading higher, tracking positive US markets. Shares of Tata Consultancy Services (TCS), Wipro and Infosys will remain in focus today as all three of India’s top Infomation Technology services companies will announce their third-quarter results on the same day for the first time. TCS, Infosys and Wipro are expected to report strong numbers on Wednesday led by robust client demand, according to analysts. Ahead of Q3 earnings announcements by the IT heavyweights, heavy buying was seen in IT stocks on Tuesday. [ad_2] Source link

[ad_1] Research detailing overt demographic references in appraisal reports has sparked anger from appraisers, even as they express dismay at the findings. “I was sickened when I read it,” said St. Petersburg, Florida-based appraiser Francois “Frank” Gregoire. “I was extremely upset that any of that stuff would be in an appraisal report.” Rodman Schley, president of appraisal trade association the Appraisal Institute, called the Federal Housing Finance Agency’s findings, which it presented in a December blog post, “unacceptable,” and said more work is required to recognize and interrupt unconscious bias. “This means looking at our processes and approach, recruiting more appraisers of color and women, ensuring consumers know their rights, and reinforcing ethics, education, and training,” said Schley. But Schley also cast doubt on whether the bias references came from appraisers. “We understand some of the comments may not be from appraisers themselves, but extractions from real estate listing information that gets included in appraisal reports,” Schley said in a statement. The FHFA declined to comment to HousingWire about whether the references came from real estate listing information. The research from the regulator, which oversees Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, identified references of race, demographics and ethnicity in the free-form text section of an unspecified number of appraisal reports. The references, the FHFA said, suggest that racial and ethnic compositions of a neighborhood could still impact how appraisers establish value. But for appraisers, the blog post left many questions unanswered. Neither FHFA nor the GSEs would provide a time period for the references. They also declined to say how pervasive they were, whether they occurred in specific geographic areas, or if specific appraisers or appraisal firms wrote the references. Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac referred specific questions about the blog post to FHFA. “Our intent with the blog post was to further the FHFA’s commitment to addressing appraisal discrimination by providing specific examples that we identified of how overt statements can be present in appraisals,” a spokesperson for FHFA said. The blog “was not intended to address the full scope of how appraisal bias can occur, how frequently it occurs over time, or whether it occurs more in certain areas.” The references the FHFA uncovered also cast doubt on the effectiveness of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac’s appraisal oversight. “Every single appraisal report that goes to Fannie Mae gets a Collateral Underwriter score,” said Gregoire. “What was the score on these appraisals? Were they exemplary, or at the bottom of the heap?” Show me the context  Appraisers were confounded by the research findings’ lack of geography, time and generalization about the frequency of its findings. Presenting the comments without context is “irresponsible,” according to Joan Trice, founder of the Collateral Risk Network. “If we don’t know the size and scope of the search, and [the FHFA] won’t be transparent about the frequency of the occurrences, it raises questions as to what their motives are,” said Trice. “Are they just pandering to the Biden administration?” How to address racial bias in appraisals is a highly-charged topic, and a top priority of the Biden administration. President Biden tasked the Department of Housing and Urban Development with leading an interagency task force — of which FHFA is a member — to make policy recommendations to combat bias in appraisals. The task force’s report is expected early this year. But even as federal regulators tackle the problem, it is still unclear how bias typically manifests in the appraisal process. The overt references to race, demographics and neighborhood makeup in the free-form text box of an appraisal report is one way bias could show up. Anecdotes in numerous news stories — and at least one lawsuit — have detailed appraisers low-balling Black homeowners. And no one has said, definitively, how pervasive appraisal bias is. Freddie Mac produced a research report in September that found that a substantially higher share of homes in Black communities were valued at less than the contract price compared to homes in white neighborhoods and homes in Latino areas. HUD said in 2021 it had seen an uptick of complaints of appraisal bias, but news reports at the time said the agency had received just a handful of complaints. The agency has repeatedly declined to provide HousingWire with the number of appraiser bias complaints it has received, stating that it does not disclose the complaints “due to confidentiality filings.” The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau also receives complaints from consumers, and has received about 14 complaints of appraiser bias since 2019. “One example of this is one too many,” said Jonathan Miller, CEO of appraisal firm Miller Samuel. “But if we’re looking at 10 to 12 comments from 1000 appraisals, versus 100 million appraisals, the context is sorely needed.” Late flags Appraisers also question why the government-sponsored entities have not raised red flags about sub-standard appraisals before now. “I’m embarrassed by what appraisers wrote and included in their reports,” said Gregoire. “But I’m flabbergasted by the GSEs and their regulator.” Appraisal reports have been in digital form since 2011. Neither Fannie Mae nor Freddie Mac have made their appraisal data publicly available for academic researchers to comb through, and it’s not clear whether their review processes effectively weed out potential bias. Paul Ryll, a certified residential appraiser and co-founder of Oscar Mike Mobile Appraisals, questioned why overt references in appraisal reports have not been brought to light until now. “It seems like a reaction, instead of being proactive,” Ryll said. “Why is this just coming up now? Both of the GSEs claim they review appraisal reports for quality. Fannie Mae’s appraisal quality monitoring process — separate from its Collateral Underwriter risk score — is meant to identify “appraisers whose appraisal reports exhibit patterns of appraisal quality issues for the purposes of training and education,” the enterprise explains. Such a review process might catch overt references to protected class and subjective statements that have no place in appraisal reports. But it’s unclear how often it does so. If an appraisal report triggers

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[ad_1] Vodafone Idea’s board on Tuesday informed the department of telecommunications (DoT) that it will opt for converting the interest on adjusted gross revenue (AGR) and spectrum dues into government equity. Once the plan goes through over a period of four years, the government will become the single largest shareholder in the company with a stake of 35.8%. Post the equity conversion, the government will also become a creditor for the company, which would have some positives as well as negatives for Vodafone Idea. On the positive side, the company would be in a better financial position to raise external funds and there will be a possibility of flexibility in future payments to the government. Further, the government would have an interest in protecting the equity value of the company. On the negative side, potential concerns with regard to management style, governance, capital allocation, etc, could arise but all this would depend on how much the government gets involved in the management/board of the company. Analysts said that while Vodafone Idea’s near-term existential concerns have been addressed by this move, the onus is still on the company to successfully complete its capital raise, accelerate network investments and stem subscriber losses. The company would also need to make more meaningful tariff hikes in the days to come. “…the board of directors, at its meeting held on January 10, 2022, has approved the conversion of the full amount of such interest related to spectrum auction instalments and AGR dues into equity. The net present value (NPV) of this interest is expected to be about `16,000 crore as per the company’s best estimates, subject to confirmation by the DoT,” Vodafone Idea said in a regulatory filing. “The conversion will, therefore, result in dilution of all the existing shareholders of the company, including the promoters. Following conversion, it is expected that the government will hold around 35.8% of the total outstanding shares of the company, and that the promoter shareholders would hold around 28.5% (Vodafone Group) and around 17.8% (Aditya Birla Group), respectively,” the filing said. The shares will be issued to the government on a preferential basis and relevant date for pricing would be August 14, 2021, the filing said. “The government, at its sole discretion, may convert any part of such loan to preference shares instead of equity shares and such preference shares may be optionally or compulsorily convertible and/or redeemable and/or participating in nature. The shares may be held through the statutory undertaking of the Unit Trust of India (SUUTI) on behalf of the government of India or by any trustee-type or other suitable arrangement,” Vodafone Idea said. Since the average price of Vodafone Idea’s shares at the relevant date of August 14, 2021, was below par value, the equity shares will be issued to the government at par value of Rs 10 per share subject to the final confirmation by the DoT. The government has given telecom operators an option of paying interest for the four years of deferment on the deferred spectrum instalments and AGR dues by way of conversion into equity of the NPV of such interest amount. The loss-making and financially-constrained, Vodafone Idea, which is the country’s third largest telecom operator, has total AGR dues of Rs 58,254 crore of which it has paid Rs 7,854 crore. As is known, Bharti Airtel has opted for the four-year moratorium on payment of AGR and spectrum dues but not for conversion of interest into equity by the government. Reliance Jio has opted for neither of the provisions, which were part of the September 15, 2021, package offered by the government to the telecom operators. Annual instalments before the government’s relief package for Vodafone Idea amounted to Rs 15,000 crore for spectrum and `9,000 crore for AGR, which came to a total of Rs 96,000 crore for four years. With this amount now deferred, and interest on deferral converted to equity, total interest comes to Rs 19,500-20,000 crore assuming an 8-9% interest rate and the present value of this comes to Rs 16,000 crore. [ad_2] Source link

[ad_1] Fannie Mae opened 2022 with its 45th credit-risk transfer (CRT) deal through its Connecticut Avenue Securities (CAS) real estate mortgage investment conduit, or REMIC, bringing the collective value of notes issued through the conduit to nearly $52 billion since the first offering in 2013. The 45 CAS deals involved credit-risk transfer (CRT) notes issued to private investors against reference loan pools of single-family mortgages valued collectively as of the time of the transactions at just under $1.7 trillion. The initial deal of 2022 is the start of what is expected to be a busy year For Fannie Mae on the CRT front. “In 2022, we look forward to bringing [to market] approximately $15 billion in our on-the-run CAS REMIC transactions, subject to market conditions and other factors,” said Devang Doshi, senior vice president of single-family capital markets at Fannie Mae.  Through a CRT transaction, private investors participate with government-sponsored enterprises (GSEs) Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac in sharing a portion of the mortgage credit risk in the reference loan pools retained by the GSEs. Investors receive principal and interest payments on the CRT notes they purchase, but if credit losses exceed a predefined threshold per the security issued, then investors are responsible for absorbing the losses exceeding that mark. “When they do a credit-risk transfer transaction, it’s taking risk from that huge bucket [the reference loan pool] and selling off most of the credit-risk pieces,” said Roelof Slump, managing director of U.S. RMBS at Fitch Ratings.  The initial CRT deal of 2022, CAS 2022-R01, involves a $1.5 billion note issued against a reference loan pool of 180,002 residential mortgages with an outstanding principle balance of $53.7 billion. In the final CRT deal of 2021, CAS 2021-R03, Fannie Mae issued a $909 million note against a reference pool of 117,000 single-family mortgages valued at about $35 billion.  The prior two deals in 2021 involved CRT notes with a combined value of nearly $2.2 billion. CAS Series 2021-R02, was issued in November and involved transferring loan-portfolio risk to private investors via a $984 million note offering backed by a reference pool of some 125,000 single-family mortgage loans valued at $35 billion. In October, the agency made a $1.2 billion CRT note offering, CAS Series 2021-R01, backed by a reference pool of 246,836 single-family mortgage valued at $72 billion. Prior to restarting CRT offerings last year, Fannie Mae had backed away from the CRT market for a time — with its prior transaction closing in March 2020. Fannie and Freddie’s efforts on the CRT front were bolstered recently by pending changes to their capital-reserve rules that are being advanced by the Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA), which oversees the GSEs. Pre-sale reports prepared by Kroll Bond Rating Agency on Fannie’s latest two deals include a note caution for at least one facet of the agency’s CRT transactions. The reports point out that appraisal waivers were issued for about 44% of the reference pools in each transaction.  “Loans with appraisal waivers have comprised an increasing percentage of agency loans, including those in CRT reference pools,” the KBRA notes in the presale reports for both the CAS 2021-R03 and CAS 2022-R01 deals. “It should be noted that while the acceptability of a property value or sales price based on the use of proprietary models and market data is assessed, it does so without Fannie Mae having performed a property review or having obtained a valuation of the property. “As a result, KBRA applied a broad valuation haircut to such loans.” The KBRA reports also indicate that the reference-pool loans in both CRT deals have broad geographic diversity, compared with typical non-agency deals, which helps to insulate the mortgage pools from regional economic shocks. In addition, the borrowers involved in each deal have solid credit scores — in the range of 760 on average — and an average debit-to-income ratio of 33.7%, which the KBRA reports state is “consistent with prime-quality underwriting.” On another front, the other government-sponsored enterprise giant Freddie Mac, recently announced that its single-family credit risk transfer (CRT) program is projecting note volume of at least $25 billion in 2022.  Its CRT program was founded with Freddie Mac’s issuance of the first Structured Agency Credit Risk (STACR) notes in July 2013. In November 2013, its Agency Credit Insurance Structure(ACIS) program was introduced.  Freddie Mac issued more than $18 billion in CRT notes across 10 STACR and 11 ACIS deals in 2021, according to the agency. Some 50% of the Freddie’s single-family mortgage portfolio, or more than $2.5 trillion in mortgages, is covered by credit enhancements, according to an agency press release. “Freddie Mac … plans to optimize our CRT offerings in 2022,” said Mike Reynolds, vice president of single-family CRT at Freddie Mac. “We expect a record year for STACR and ACIS issuance.” The post Fannie plans $15B in CRT deals in 2022 appeared first on HousingWire. [ad_2] Source link

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[ad_1] I’ve been writing about money for almost eleven years now, and in that time the world has become an immensely richer place. Here in the US, our economy has grown by about 25% even after inflation, world economic output has grown even faster, and the number of people living in extreme poverty has been cut roughly in half. US Real Economic Growth over the Mustachian Era If this seems like just a fluke, you might be happy to learn that it is not. This is just the latest decade in a long era of increasing wealth. Here’s a similar chart, but zoomed out to cover the past 1.2 centuries and include the whole world: World economic output, even after inflation. What’s your guess at what might happen next? (source: Our World In Data) If you’ve been following the Principles of Mustachianism for a while now, you have probably noticed the same thing: “Gosh Darnit, it may just be a long run of good luck, but today I am richer than ever!” By the Way: Are you new here and ready for the full zero-to-hero program on wealth and less-ridiculous living? I have set up a Free “MMM Bootcamp” email series which you can join here if you click the drop-down box and find the “bonus option”. No spam, no courses to sell, just the 35-ish most useful articles from the entire history of this blog, spoon-fed to you on a weekly basis until you graduate. . For people who have combined solid money habits with this long economic boom, this means that early retirements have come even earlier than expected, and I have noticed the same thing: my own net worth has gone up several hundred percent since officially “retiring” in 2011. Sure, I’ve continued to live a Mustachian lifestyle and spend less than I earn. But most of the boost has come from the increasing value of productive investments including houses, shares in companies, and local businesses. Still,  throughout all this time, as the world churned on and we all got richer, I have received a stream of critical comments like this one claiming that Inflation is the critical flaw that means none of this is real: Does Nick Have a Point? Is Inflation going to Kill us? Inflation has been around since the dawn of money, so we know that it can co-exist with an increase in prosperity. But for the past few decades, the rate of inflation in most rich economies has been extremely low, which means it simply hasn’t been at the top of the news headlines.  Until today, when inflation has made a sudden return. Suddenly, everyone from Ted the Conservative Senator to Chad the Newly minted Bitcoin Bro is going off about about how “The Fed is debasing our currency by printing too much money“, “We’re already seeing hyperinflation” and everything is just about to slide into the shitter.   So should we be worried? Well, let’s start by ignoring the talking heads and opening up a proper graph of what has actually been happening: Red line: overall inflation rate over roughly my lifetime.Blue line: same thing but with volatile food and energy prices stripped out.Summary: inflation fluctuates, no big deal. So it looks like this year, we are seeing overall prices rise at a 5-6% rate. More than the 2% we had become accustomed to, but far less than the 70s and 80s. But still, what does this really mean? As always, Warren Buffett has a wise and concise opinion on the subject, paraphrased as: “Over my lifetime, the US dollar has lost over ninety percent of its purchasing power. Yet even after adjusting for that inflation, the net output of our economy has grown by over twenty times – over 2000%” So the opinions vary widely. But in order to form a valid opinion for ourselves, let’s just dive in and understand the underlying big picture. It’s surprisingly simple. What Causes Inflation? This part of it is quite intuitive: when too much money is chasing too few goods and services, you get inflation. For example, If there is only one house for sale in town and you and I both really want it, we are going to place competing bids back and forth, and the seller will let it go to the highest bidder. Houses are the perfect illustration of supply and demand, because people want them so much that they will go nuts trying to outbid each other, and thus the prices can get high. When this happens, economists say that the demand is inelastic. Meanwhile, some things are considered less essential, which means our demand for them becomes more elastic. If you’re accustomed to buying bananas at 69 cents per pound and suddenly the price jumps to $2.99, your response is likely to be  “TWO NINETY NINE!!!?? FUCK THAT WHAT KIND OF DAMN FOOL DO YOU TAKE ME FOR? I’ll just skip the bananas this week.” Demand becomes even more elastic if we have the option of substitute goods. If you have just finished cussing out the $2.99 bananas but then see a pile of 99 cent per pound apples, you will likely just switch to the new fruit this week. And then do the opposite next week if the price trend reverses. Price Competition Meanwhile, all of this decision-making goes on in reverse on the other side of the cash register. If Pete’s Grocery store tries to jack up its banana prices to $2.99, but Jill across the street is still offering them for 99 cents, people will just vote with their wallets and Jill will get almost all the business. Elastic Supply On the other hand, if there is a worldwide shortage of bananas, then there just aren’t enough to go around. This causes more of that “selling to the highest bidder” we saw with the houses above, which means the wholesale prices that all the grocery stores have to pay goes up. Does this mean $2.99