by Calculated Risk on 10/15/2008 05:26:00 PM

From Bloomberg: S&P Reviews $280.1 Billion of Alt-A Mortgage Debt

Standard & Poor's said it may downgrade $280.1 billion of Alt-A mortgage securities, the most that the ratings company has identified in a single announcement for bonds backed by the loans.

The debt may be cut in part because S&P has boosted estimates for losses on each foreclosure on Alt-A loans with at least five years of fixed rates to 40 percent, from 35 percent ...

``There has been a persistent rise in the level of delinquencies among the Alt-A mortgage loans supporting these transactions,'' S&P analysts Scott Davey and Ernestine Warner said in the statement.

The beat goes on.