Fitch Expects to Rate J.P. Morgan Mortgage Trust 2015-IVR2; Presale Issued

Fitch Ratings expects to rate J.P. Morgan Mortgage Trust 2015-IVR2 as follows:

--$250,000,000 class A-1 certificates 'AAAsf'; Outlook Stable;

--$66,570,000 class A-2 exchangeable certificates 'AAAsf'; Outlook Stable;

--$66,570,000 class A-3 exchangeable certificates 'AAAsf'; Outlook Stable;

--$66,570,000 class A-4 certificates 'AAAsf'; Outlook Stable;

--$31,657,000 class A-5 certificates 'AAsf'; Outlook Stable;

--$66,570,000 class A-X-1 notional certificates 'AAAsf'; Outlook Stable;

--$66,570,000 class A-X-2 notional certificates 'AAAsf'; Outlook Stable;

--$66,570,000 class A-X-3 exchangeable notional certificates 'AAAsf'; Outlook Stable;

--$1,676,000 class B-1 certificates 'AAsf'; Outlook Stable;

--$8,753,000 class B-2 certificates 'Asf'; Outlook Stable;

--$6,145,000 class B-3 certificates 'BBBsf'; Outlook Stable;

--$2,793,000 class B-4 certificates 'BBsf'; Outlook Stable.

The $4,842,209.77 class B-5 certificates will not be rated.

KEY RATING DRIVERS

High Quality Adjustable-Rate Mortgages: The collateral pool consists of seven-year hybrid adjustable-rate mortgages (ARMs) to borrowers with strong credit profiles, low leverage, and substantial liquid reserves. All of the loans were originated by FRB, which Fitch considers to be an above-average originator of prime jumbo product. Third-party, loan-level due diligence was conducted on 100% of the pool with minimal findings, indicating strong underwriting controls.

Payment Shock Exposure: The pool consists entirely of ARM loans while approximately 39% also have interest-only (IO) features. Loan products that result in periodic changes in a borrower's payment such as ARMs and IOs expose borrowers to payment reset risk. Future rises in interest rates and payment re-amortization after the expiration of interest-only periods can increase monthly payments considerably. To account for this risk, Fitch applied a probability of default (PD) penalty of approximately 1.66x to the ARM loans without IO terms and 1.76x to those with IO features.

High Geographic Concentration: The pool's primary concentration risk is California, where 57.7% of the properties are located. In addition, 87.9% of the properties are located in the pool's top five metropolitan statistical areas (MSA) in California, New York, and Massachusetts. The pool has significant regional concentrations, which resulted in an additional penalty of approximately 66% to the pool's lifetime default expectation.

Small Loan Count Risk: Transactions with a small number of loans carry the risk that portfolio performance may be negatively affected by a few assets that underperform relative to the statistically derived assumptions underlying their ratings. While total loan count in this pool is 382, the weighted average number of loans (WAN) is 266. This resulted in a 6% penalty on the PD.

Leakage from Reviewer Expenses: The trust is obligated to reimburse the breach reviewer, Pentalpha Surveillance LLC (Pentalpha), each month for any reasonable out-of-pocket expenses incurred if the company is requested to participate in any arbitration, legal or regulatory actions, proceedings, or hearings. These expenses include Pentalpha's legal fees and other expenses incurred outside its annual fee schedule and are not subject to a cap or certificateholder approval. Furthermore, certificateholders are obligated to pay Pentalpha a termination fee of $140,000 to terminate the contract. While Fitch accounted for the potential additional costs by upwardly adjusting its loss estimation for the pool, Fitch views this construct as adding potentially more ratings volatility than those that do not have this type of provision.

Extraordinary Expense Adjustment: Extraordinary expenses, which include loan file review costs, arbitration expenses for enforcement of the reps, and additional fees of Pentalpha, will be taken out of available funds and not accounted for in the contractual interest owed to the bondholders. This construct can result in principal and interest shortfalls to the bonds starting from the bottom of the capital structure. To account for the risk of these noncredit events reducing subordination, Fitch adjusted its loss expectations upward by 45 bps for the class A bonds, 40 bps for class B-1, and 30 bps for classes B-2 through B-4.

Tier 3 Representation and Warranty Framework: While the transaction benefits from JPMCB ('A+'/Outlook Stable/'F1') and FRB ('A-'/Outlook Stable/'F1') as representation and warranty (rep and warranty) providers for the pool, Fitch believes the value of the rep and warranty framework is diluted by the presence of qualifying and conditional language in conjunction with sunset provisions, which reduces lender breach liability. While the agency believes the high credit quality pool and clean diligence results mitigate these risks, Fitch considered the weaker framework in its analysis.

RATING SENSITIVITIES

After Fitch determines credit ratings through a rating stress scenario analysis, additional sensitivity analyses are considered. The analyses provide a defined stress sensitivity to demonstrate how the ratings would react to steeper MVDs than assumed at issuance as well as a defined sensitivity that demonstrates the stress assumptions required to reduce a rating by one full category, to non-investment grade, and to 'CCCsf'.

The defined stress sensitivity analysis focuses on determining how the ratings would react to steeper MVDs at the national level. The analysis assumes MVDs of 10%, 20%, and 30%, in addition to the model projected 5.8% for this pool. The analysis indicates there is some potential rating migration with higher MVDs, compared with the model projection.

Fitch also conducted defined rating sensitivities analyses which determine the stresses to MVDs that would reduce a rating by one full category, to non-investment grade, and to 'CCCsf'. For example, additional MVDs of 6%, 30% and 54% could potentially lower the 'AAAsf' rated class one rating category, to non-investment grade, and to 'CCCsf', respectively.

Fitch's stress and rating sensitivity analysis are discussed in the presale report titled 'J.P. Morgan Mortgage Trust 2015-IVR2', dated February 2015, which is available on Fitch's web site 'www.fitchratings.com'.

Additional information is available at 'www.fitchratings.com'.

Applicable Criteria and Related Research:

--Global Structured Finance Rating Criteria (August 2014);

--Counterparty Criteria for Structured Finance and Covered Bonds (May 2014);

--U.S. RMBS Master Rating Criteria (July 2014);

--U.S. RMBS Loan Loss Model Criteria (November 2014);

--U.S. RMBS Cash Flow Analysis Criteria (April 2014);

--U.S. Residential and Small Balance Commercial Mortgage Servicers Rating Criteria (January 2014);

--U.S. RMBS Surveillance and Re-REMIC Criteria (June 2014).

Applicable Criteria and Related Research: J.P. Morgan Mortgage Trust 2015-IVR2 (US RMBS)

http://www.fitchratings.com/creditdesk/reports/report_frame.cfm?rpt_id=862933

Additional Disclosure

Solicitation Status

http://www.fitchratings.com/gws/en/disclosure/solicitation?pr_id=980747

ALL FITCH CREDIT RATINGS ARE SUBJECT TO CERTAIN LIMITATIONS AND DISCLAIMERS. PLEASE READ THESE LIMITATIONS AND DISCLAIMERS BY FOLLOWING THIS LINK: HTTP://FITCHRATINGS.COM/UNDERSTANDINGCREDITRATINGS. IN ADDITION, RATING DEFINITIONS AND THE TERMS OF USE OF SUCH RATINGS ARE AVAILABLE ON THE AGENCY'S PUBLIC WEBSITE 'WWW.FITCHRATINGS.COM'. PUBLISHED RATINGS, CRITERIA AND METHODOLOGIES ARE AVAILABLE FROM THIS SITE AT ALL TIMES. FITCH'S CODE OF CONDUCT, CONFIDENTIALITY, CONFLICTS OF INTEREST, AFFILIATE FIREWALL, COMPLIANCE AND OTHER RELEVANT POLICIES AND PROCEDURES ARE ALSO AVAILABLE FROM THE 'CODE OF CONDUCT' SECTION OF THIS SITE. FITCH MAY HAVE PROVIDED ANOTHER PERMISSIBLE SERVICE TO THE RATED ENTITY OR ITS RELATED THIRD PARTIES. DETAILS OF THIS SERVICE FOR RATINGS FOR WHICH THE LEAD ANALYST IS BASED IN AN EU-REGISTERED ENTITY CAN BE FOUND ON THE ENTITY SUMMARY PAGE FOR THIS ISSUER ON THE FITCH WEBSITE.

Contacts:

Fitch Ratings
Primary Analyst
Christine Yan
Director
+1-212-908-0838
Fitch Ratings, Inc.
33 Whitehall Street
New York, NY 10004
or
Secondary Analyst
Matthew Shaw
Analyst
+1-212-908-0218
or
Committee Chairperson
Rui Pereira
Managing Director
+1-212-908-0766
or
Media Relations
Sandro Scenga, +1 212-908-0278
sandro.scenga@fitchratings.com

Data & News supplied by www.cloudquote.io
Stock quotes supplied by Barchart
Quotes delayed at least 20 minutes.
By accessing this page, you agree to the following
Privacy Policy and Terms and Conditions.