Ginnie Mae has been without a permanent leader since January 2017, but that could soon change, as the Trump administration announced Tuesday that it is formally nominating Michael Bright to serve as president of Ginnie Mae.
If confirmed, Bright would take over officially for former Ginnie Mae President Ted Tozer, who stepped down at the beginning of the Trump administration.
Bright works at Ginnie Mae already, having joined the government agency back in July 2017 as executive vice president and chief operating officer.
Bright has also been serving as interim president since July, serving as Ginnie Mae’s de facto leader and representing the agency before Congress, among other duties.
Now, Bright is positioned to assume the leadership of Ginnie Mae in an official capacity.
As acting president of Ginnie Mae, Bright oversees the agency’s activities, including its mortgage bond undertakings. Ginnie Mae, unlike Fannie Mae or Freddie Mac, insures mortgages with the explicit backing of the federal government.
And Ginnie Mae’s portfolio is growing.
Earlier this week, Ginnie Mae announced that its outstanding mortgage-backed securities portfolio grew to $1.95 trillion in the month of April. That’s up more than $100 billion from April 2017’s total of $1.819 trillion.
Bright came to Ginnie Mae from the Milken Institute, a think tank. At the Milken Institute, Bright worked in the think tank’s Center for Financial Markets, where he led the housing program.
Prior to working at Milken, Bright was a top aide to Sen. Bob Corker, R-Tennessee. While working for Corker, Bright helped author the Corker-Warner housing finance reform bill, which failed in the Senate in 2015 and would have seen Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac wound down and replaced.
After leaving Capitol Hill, Bright went to work at BlackRock, serving as a vice president in the company’s financial advisory operation.
Bright left BlackRock after less than a year to move to PennyMac, where he served as senior vice president of business development.
Earlier in his career, Bright spent two years at the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, where he served as a mortgage data analyst in OCC’s large bank supervision operation.
Bright also spent time with Wachovia Bank and Countrywide Financial early on his career.
Now, Bright could soon be leading Ginnie Mae on an official basis, pending Congressional approval, of course.
[Image above courtesy of Shutterstock.com]
