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Fitch Downgrades 2 & Affirms 4 RMBS Classes from 2 Ameriquest Issues.


NEW YORK New York, state, United States
New York, Middle Atlantic state of the United States. It is bordered by Vermont, Massachusetts, Connecticut, and the Atlantic Ocean (E), New Jersey and Pennsylvania (S), Lakes Erie and Ontario and the Canadian province of
 -- Fitch Ratings Fitch Ratings

An international rating agency for financial institutions, insurance companies, and corporate, sovereign, and municipal debt. Fitch Ratings has headquarters in New York and London and is wholly owned by FIMALAC of Paris.
 has taken rating actions on the following Ameriquest Mortgage Ameriquest was one of the United States's leading wholesale subprime lenders. Ameriquest was founded in 1979, in Orange County, California, as a bank, Long Beach Savings & Loan.  Securities Inc. (AMSI AMSI Australian Mathematical Sciences Institute
AMSI Ambient Surround Imaging
AMSI Atlantic Merchant Shipping Instructions
AMSI Ameritech Message Signal Interface
) home equity issues:

AMSI series 2002-C

--Class A affirmed at 'AAA';

--Class M1 affirmed at 'BBB';

--Class M2 downgraded to 'B' from 'BBB-' and is removed from Rating Watch Negative.

AMSI series 2002-3

--Class M-2 affirmed at 'AA-';

--Class M-3 affirmed at 'BBB';

--Class M-4 downgraded to 'B' from 'BBB-' and is removed from Rating Watch Negative.

The affirmations reflect satisfactory credit enhancement Credit Enhancement

A method whereby a company attempts to improve its debt or credit worthiness.

Notes:
Credit enhancements take many different forms. An example of a credit enhancement would be conversion rights added on to a debt instrument in order to lower the issuing
 (CE) relationships to future loss expectations and affect approximately $193.64 million. In the case of series 2002-C class A, affirmation on this class reflects the Freddie Mac Freddie Mac: see Federal Home Loan Mortgage Corporation.  guarantee of timely distribution on interest and ultimate distribution of principle on the offered certificates and affect approximately $79.48 million of outstanding certificates. The downgrades, affecting approximately $28.97 million of the outstanding certificates, are taken as a result of a deteriorating relationship between CE and expected loss.

All of the loans were either originated or acquired by Ameriquest Mortgage Company, which also serves as the servicer (rated 'RSP2+' by Fitch). Ameriquest Mortgage Company is a specialty finance company engaged in the business of originating, purchasing, and selling mortgage loans.

The underlying collateral consists of fully amortizing 15- to 30-year fixed-and adjustable-rate mortgages Adjustable-rate mortgage (ARM)

A mortgage that features predetermined adjustments of the loan interest rate at regular intervals based on an established index. The interest rate is adjusted at each interval to a rate equivalent to the index value plus a predetermined spread, or
 secured by first liens on one- to four-family residential properties extended to subprime borrowers. As of the May 2006 distribution date, the series 2002-C is 42 months seasoned and series 2002-3 is 44 months seasoned. The pool factors (current principal balance as a percentage of original) are approximately 11% and 10%, respectively.

Due to differences in prepayment behavior, the geographic composition of the pools has changed significantly since issuance. Borrowers located in areas enjoying rapid home appreciation have prepaid at a much faster rate than borrowers located in areas with relatively slow home price appreciation. As a result, a large percentage of the remaining pool is now located in states which have experienced slower-than-average home price appreciation trends. Approximately 40% of the remaining loans in both pools are secured by properties in Indiana, Ohio, Michigan, Illinois, Pennsylvania and Texas. Loans located in these states have generally been more likely to default and have generally experienced high loss severities. This is expected to continue to put upward pressure on loss trends going forward.

Series 2002-C collateral losses have exceeded excess spread (XS) nine times (x) out of the past 12 months causing the overcollateralization (OC) to fall below its target amount. The current OC is at $3,648,590 which falls short of its target by $2,851,410. The cumulative loss as a percentage of the original pool balance is 1.71% and the delinquency rate (including 60+, bankruptcy foreclosure foreclosure

Legal proceeding by which a borrower's rights to a mortgaged property may be extinguished if the borrower fails to live up to the obligations agreed to in the loan contract.
, and REO reo
Noun

NZ a language [Maori]
) as a percentage of the current pool balance is 24.6%.

The OC for series 2002-3 is also currently below its target due to losses that have exceeded XS 10x out of the last 12 months. The current OC amount is 2,782,719, about 3.46% of current principal balance. The cumulative loss as a percentage of the original pool balance is 2.08% and the delinquency rate (including 60+, bankruptcy foreclosure, and REO) as a percentage of the current pool balance is 27.94%.

Both transactions are currently failing their delinquency trigger tests and Fitch expects that the triggers will continue to fail therefore the transactions will distribute principal sequentially among the classes. As a result, the credit risk for the mezzanine and senior classes is mitigated.

Further information regarding current delinquency, loss, and credit enhancement statistics is available on the Fitch Ratings web site at www.fitchratings.com.

Fitch's rating definitions and the terms of use Terms of Use are rules set up by the owner of an intellectual property or service to govern how they may be legally used.

In many cases, terms of service are used as a contractual agreement between a company and users of a service they provide.
 of such ratings are available on the agency's public site, www.fitchratings.com. Published ratings, criteria and methodologies are available from this site, at all times. Fitch's code of conduct, confidentiality, conflicts of interest, affiliate firewall, compliance and other relevant policies and procedures Policies and Procedures are a set of documents that describe an organization's policies for operation and the procedures necessary to fulfill the policies. They are often initiated because of some external requirement, such as environmental compliance or other governmental  are also available from the 'Code of Conduct' section of this site.
COPYRIGHT 2006 Business Wire
No portion of this article can be reproduced without the express written permission from the copyright holder.
Copyright 2006, Gale Group. All rights reserved. Gale Group is a Thomson Corporation Company.

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Comment:Fitch Downgrades 2 & Affirms 4 RMBS Classes from 2 Ameriquest Issues.
Publication:Business Wire
Geographic Code:1USA
Date:May 26, 2006
Words:667
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