Suncorp arrears shock in 2010 residential mortgage bond
Suncorp has unexpectedly declared a residential mortgage bond worth $120 million may not repay all investors.
It came after the share of borrowers in arrears rose to a trigger point, putting the distributions in doubt.
It has been reported it ranks as the first local mortgage bond to encounter difficulty since the global financial crisis, although this is disputed.
The original mortgage pool was heavy orientated to Queensland properties.
There are now around 1000 of the original 4800 loans still owing at an average $118,000.
“It certainly is a canary," CLSA banking analyst Brian Johnson said, although others suggest not so.
“To get to this point, for a securitisation this old to go bust — that is weird,” Mr Johnson said.
“We think it is an isolated case,” Commonwealth Bank says in a credit strategy note Tuesday. “We are cautious of the development but not alarmed.”
The tranche of mortgages in the Apollo series trust sold in 2010 reached a rate of 3 per cent of borrowers more than 60 days overdue on their mortgage, the Queensland-based bank yesterday said.
Suncorp said the announcement did not affect other tranches of loans in the Apollo trust.
The 3 per cent arrears figure on the group of borrowers is three times the rate of arrears in Suncorp’s broader mortgage portfolio of about 1 per cent.
The series trust which has shrunk from its original volume of $1 billion since it was first sold to investors.
Suncorp said all investors were expected to continue to receive monthly payments on the instalments on interest, but the principal amount on their investment would be diverted from subordinated debt holders to the highest class of shareholders, AAA note holders.
The distributions will be then staggered according to the class of shareholders until all funds are exhausted.
Suncorp also expected the Apollo trust tranche to shrink further over the coming year to meet the 10 per cent threshold which allows the bank to close the trust.
The bank said at this point, subject to regulatory approval, it was expected that all holders were expected to receive the full principal amount once the trust was called.
“In the case of the APOLLO Series 2010-1, this is a very small number of customers going into arrears. As for the broader Suncorp retail portfolio, the total arrears is low at around 1 per cent,” a Suncorp spokesman said.
The mortgage bond was referred to in a 2012 RBA analysis of LVRs.
There is no indication of the location of the properties in default, with speculation the bond has disproportionate amounts of mining-boom towns.
There was a strong Brisbane presence in the original loans.
The purchase price for the mortgage loans was $999,949,816.
They were required, generally, to be secured by a registered first ranking mortgage over Australian residential property (in limited circumstances a property can be secured by a second ranking mortgage).
It has been suggested the incident is not unprecedented, as other securitisation transactions have failed step down provisions in recent years due to delinquency rates and unreimbursed charge-offs that were subsequently repaid or cured and the transactions in question have reverted to pro-rata pay.
These step-down provisions are in place to protect senior note-holders and on each occasion the mechanisms have worked as planned.
For the Apollo 2010-1, there are no charge-offs to outstanding notes, all principal balances of notes are still 100% (i.e. Invested Amount equals Stated Amount per 3rd Feb reporting).
The transaction features 100% mortgage insurance coverage (LMI) from QBE LMI, which provides an additional layer of coverage for the noteholders in the event of mortgage default; to date there have been zero reported losses on sale with no LMI claims.
The current transactions size is $120 million down from an original $1bn, a pool factor of 12 percent.
The transaction features a 10 percent clean up call.
Suncorp have exercised these 10 percent clean up-calls on previously outstanding transactions.
