MFA Financial reports Q2 EPS 44c, consensus 38c

Reports Q2: MFA closed the quarter with unrestricted cash of $289.4M. Commenting on the quarter, Craig Knutson, MFA’s CEO and President, stated: “We are pleased to announce strong results for what was yet another volatile quarter in the fixed income and mortgage markets. We generated Distributable earnings of $0.44 per share and our Economic book value rose to $14.34 per share. We continued to execute our strategy of acquiring residential mortgage assets at attractive levels. During the quarter, we purchased or originated $688 million residential mortgage loans with an average coupon of 9.6%. We also added $176 million of Agency MBS.” Mr. Knutson continued: “On the liability side, we repaid the remaining $170 million balance of our maturing convertible notes and issued $75 million of 9.00% senior unsecured notes due in August 2029. We completed two securitizations collateralized by $557 million of Non-QM and Transitional loans. We also securitized $303 million of primarily re-performing loans subsequent to quarter-end. Finally, we once again benefited from our $3.3 billion interest rate swap position, which generated a net positive carry of $29 million.” revenue $, consensus $.