GENERAL SESSION: Mortgage Market Trends

Sr Manager - Mortgage and Capital Markets, FICO

Monica Von Egidy is a Senior Manager in FICO’s Scores Division. Her focus is building and maintaining operations for the Mortgage and Capital Markets team as they grow their presence in the mortgage industry. She also leads the branch of the team dedicated to technology vendor partnerships and analytical insights. Prior to joining FICO, Monica gained expertise in various roles of the Mortgage industry, starting at Movement Mortgage as a Mortgage Trading Analys, and then moving to Cardinal Financial where she spent a few years as a Senior Pricing Analyst. Most recently she worked at Cardinal Financial as a Production Analyst for Wholesale where she led channel projects focused on growing the business and improving processes. Monica holds a B.S in finance from Wingate University.

Chief Economist, Senior Vice President, Research and Business Development, Mortgage Bankers Association

Michael Fratantoni is MBA's Chief Economist and Senior Vice President of Research and Business Development. In this role, he is responsible for overseeing MBA's industry surveys and benchmarking studies, economic and mortgage originations forecasts, and policy development research for both single-family and commercial/multifamily markets. Additionally, Fratantoni is a member of the Board of Directors of the CONVERGENCE Collaborative, and the Smith Enterprise Risk Consortium’s (SERC’s) Advisory Council. Prior to joining MBA, Fratantoni worked in risk management and senior economist roles at Washington Mutual and Fannie Mae. He received a Ph.D. in economics from Johns Hopkins University and a B.A. in economics from The College of William and Mary and has served as an adjunct professor at the University of Washington, and Johns Hopkins, George Washington, and Georgetown Universities.

Managing Director and Head of Investment Strategy, Santander US Capital Markets

Steven Abrahams is a Managing Director and Head of Investment Strategy at Santander US Capital Markets. His team provides analysis and advice for institutional investors in rates, financing markets, corporate credit, securitized products and emerging markets. Through his 34-year career, he has held senior positions at Deutsche Bank, Bear Stearns and Morgan Stanley. Steve has helped launch the market in specified agency MBS pools (1994-1995), the first agency mortgage credit risk transfer (1998), the first application of the Capital Asset Pricing Model to CLO manager performance (2018) and the first trading of FHA-only mortgage pools (2020). Steve holds a B.S. from Northwestern University and a Ph. D. from Columbia University and has taught as an adjunct professor of finance and economics at Columbia Business School. He is also the author of The Bear Stearns Quick Guide to Mortgage-Backed Securities, Competitive Advantage in Investing: Building Winning Professional Portfolios, published by John Wiley and Sons, and most recently Santander’s A Quick Guide to CLO Debt and Equity.

Senior Managing Director, Brean Capital, LLC

Over 35 years of experience developing trading strategies for institutional clients across the various fixed income sectors, with an emphasis on MBS, CMBS and other structured products. In addition to providing market insight and cross-sector relative value trade ideas, provides periodic commentary on macroeconomic themes, interest rates, mortgage prepayments and the housing markets. Prior to joining Brean Capital, was a Senior Managing Director at Bear Stearns in the Financial Analytics and Structured Transactions department (F.A.S.T.) where he headed up the Mortgage Products Group and was a senior member of the Portfolio Strategies team. Bachelor of Science in both Computer Science and Finance from Carroll University in Waukesha, Wisconsin.

Managing Director and Head of Agency MBS Research, Bank of America Securities

Jeana Curro is Managing Director and Head of Agency MBS Research at BofA Securities, specializing in relative value across Agency pass-throughs, CMOs, mortgage derivatives and Hybrid ARMs. Jeana has held similar positions at Deutsche Bank Securities, RBS Securities, and UBS Investment Bank where she was part of the Agency Structured Products Research team consistently #1 by Institutional Investor Magazine. Jeana’s research and opinions have been regularly referenced by the Wall Street Journal, Bloomberg and HousingWire Magazine. Prior to joining Bank of America, Jeana spent five years as Portfolio Manager and Subject Matter Expert at BlackRock, as part of the Financial Markets Advisory team. Jeana graduated from the University of Pennsylvania in 2004 with a Bachelor’s Degree in Mathematics.