Dechert, together with the three other leading law firms in the CMBS securitization space, Cadwalader, Wickersham & Taft LLP, Orrick, Herrington & Sutcliffe LLP and Sidley Austin LLP, published a position paper entitled “Selected risk retention questions and answers for CMBS securitizations.”… Continue Reading
Returning to our theme that nothing’s easy and everything keeps changing, here is one out of left field. Let’s talk Probable Maximum Loss (“PML”) and seismic risk. ASTM International, the market standard setting organization for everything from toilet bowls to condoms, has just issued an amended seismic standards: Standard Guide for Assessments of Buildings (E2026-16) … Continue Reading
And now to return to our commentary a few weeks back about the stultifying impact of ill-thought through rules and regulations (at best) (Brexit has intervened). This is our Regulatory State which broadly attempted to pick winners and losers and modify market behavior, to get an engineered outcome by using the blunderbuss of proscriptive rules … Continue Reading
The slow start to 2016 did not dampen the enthusiasm at CREFC’s Annual Conference, held last week in New York City. The conference saw record attendance, with standing-room-only crowds at virtually every panel. As with the Industry Leaders Conference in January, the hot topics on people’s minds were risk retention (and the rest of the … Continue Reading
With apologies to George Dangerfield, who published The Strange Death of Liberal England in 1935 chronicling the collapse of the British Liberal Party prior to World War I, I’m borrowing his title for this commentary. Okay, bear with me. Regrettably, we may be witnessing something happening to our banking system which is somewhat reminiscent of … Continue Reading
We thought it would be useful to give a quick, interim update on the slow-motion train wreck that is our industry’s response to the upcoming effectiveness of the Risk Retention Rule. For those of you who have been blessedly snoozing under a rock these past couple of years, the Risk Retention Rule becomes effective on … Continue Reading
Earlier this month CREFC held its “Commercial Real Estate Finance Summit – West” in Santa Monica, CA, which – while not nearly as large as the annual conference in New York – was still very well attended (roughly 175 attendees, an increase over last year). Given the sentiment earlier this year in Miami, the fluctuation … Continue Reading
More than two years after the first single-family rental securitization, the single-family rental market continues to evolve and grow. The rise of single-family rentals reflects both a demographic shift among the American population and a reactionary change in consumer habits resulting from the financial crises. According to U.S. Census Bureau, the percentage of Americans that … Continue Reading
Over the past few years, the ABS Vegas conference has been the place for industry participants to congratulate each other on a job well done (most recently on a record-setting 2015 for CLO primary issuance), meet-and-greet with clients and generally unwind, making sure to sprinkle a few “important” meetings across the three-day span. However, following … Continue Reading
Last week, the House Committee on Financial Services reported out the Preserving Access to CRE Capital Act of 2016 (the “bill”) in a remarkably bipartisan sort of way (paving the way for: “Well, yes, I did vote for it, but then I voted against it.”). The bill, which was drafted and backed by CREFC, would … Continue Reading
We may be approaching a tipping point where the burden of the new federal regulatory state, purportedly designed to make our economy stronger by making the banking system safer, will begin to demonstrably become a cure that’s worse than the disease. To my eye, much of the new regulatory apparatus feels like political theatre designed … Continue Reading
That whole alternate universe thing, the conceit of so many sci-fi novels, is clearly not merely the product of fevered minds. It’s real. Or, at least it seemed awfully real after having been at the CREFC meeting in Miami and the MBA/CREF meeting in Orlando during the past month.… Continue Reading
The 2016 CRE Finance Council Industry Leaders Conference, held this week in Miami, was dominated by two topics– risk retention and liquidity. Almost all the forums, panels and presentations at the conference were overshadowed by the specter of risk retention and more general concerns about liquidity. … Continue Reading