Opportunities Exist for Ginnie Mae To Improve Its Guidance and Process for Troubled Issuers

We identified gaps in Ginnie Mae’s guidance and process for troubled issuers. Ginnie Mae made progress in developing an issuer default governance framework, but has not (1) defined its authorities for marketing troubled portfolios; (2) formalized guidance for how to identify potential buyers before extinguishment; (3) established expectations for determining portfolio value, price before sale, and evaluation against other options or (4) included a step to evaluate prospective purchasers’ ability to absorb an extinguished portfolio. Additionally, we found Ginnie Mae had implemented our previous recommendation to develop and implement controls to determine the total impact of a large- or multiple-issuer default, the maximum-size default Ginnie Mae could adequately execute, and individual issuers’ ability to adapt to changing market conditions, but there was a gap related to the semiannual capacity reports submitted by master subservicers (MSS).