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» VISIT US ONLINE @ DSNEWS.COM 47 S&P/CASE-SHILLER INDEX SHOWS IMPROVEMENT IN JANUARY Single-family home prices across the country beat forecasts but still showed signs of sluggishness in January, according to one of the industry's leading home price indices. e S&P/Case-Shiller Home Price Indices showed a 0.8 percent seasonally adjusted month- over-month improvement in January, topping the 0.7 percent gain forecast in a poll of economist conducted by Reuters. On an unadjusted basis, the 20-city composite index posted its third monthly decline at -0.1 percent. e 10-city index ticked up a negligible amount, meanwhile. "e housing recovery may have taken a breather due to the cold weather," said David M. Blitzer, chairman of the Index Committee at S&P Dow Jones Indices. Compared to December, 12 cities across the nation reported price declines (unadjusted), with eight performing worse than they did at the end of 2013. Chicago and Seattle declined the most (-1.2 percent and -0.8 percent, respectively), posting their fourth straight month each of depreciation. On an annual basis, the 10- and 20-city composites reported increases of 13.5 percent and 13.2 percent, respectively, representing a step back from the 13.6 percent and 13.4 percent annual growth rates recorded in December. All cities on the 20-market composite saw growth, though S&P reports 12 of them saw their annual rates worsen. Las Vegas and San Francisco remained the only two metros to post annual gains exceeding 20 percent; prices in those cities were up 24.9 percent and 23.1 percent, respectively. San Diego showed the most improvement compared to December's rate of growth, recording a year-over-year return of 19.4 percent versus 18 percent previously. Despite the slowdown, Blitzer says recent data point to continued gains throughout 2014. "Although most analysts do not expect the same rapid increases we saw last year, the consensus is for moderating gains," he said. Additionally, the Black Knight Financial Services monthly report, released the same week as the S&P/Case Shiller report, recorded no change month-over-month and an 8 percent increase year- over-year. Raj Dosaj, VP of behavioral models and HPI for Black Knight Data & Analytics, noted at the time that the company's index isn't impacted as strongly by seasonal effects, leading to differences in the data. ELLIE MAE: CYBER ATTACKERS COULD HAVE MORTGAGE INDUSTRY KNOWLEDGE In an article reported by National Mortgage News, the recent technological attack on Ellie Mae could have been carried out by individuals with mortgage industry experience, the vendor says. e attacks occurred over a two-day span from March 31 to April 1, overwhelming the company's servers with data requests that appeared to be legitimate communications. e cyber attack flooded Ellie Mae servers with requests to a URL that is used to download an XML file containing third-party technology vendors that integrate with the Encompass LOS via the Ellie Mae Network. "It was a massive number of requests that came in and consumed the full capacity of one set of our servers around a specific URL," said Ellie Mae president and COO Jonathan Corr. "Where a classic denial-of-service attack would be a request that comes in that is not valid and would just create a lot of failed attempts, this was a valid request with a normal signature." e attack was particularly suspicious, hinting at mortgage industry knowledge, for a few key reasons. First, the request appeared valid and was using a normal signature. Additionally, the cyber- attack occurred on the last day of the month and the last day of the quarter, a critical time for loan closings. "at could be coincidence. I don't have evidence otherwise, but we find it very disturbing, and we're trying to figure it out. It seems like that could be a possibility," Corr added. e XML file being requested contains no sensitive data and appeared like a request that would come from a client application used to access Encompass and the Ellie Mae Network— making it hard to initially identify the requests as a threat. A press release issued by the company attempts to reassure users. "Ellie Mae's technical operations teams are continuing their work to restore full functionality for Encompass users," the release said. Sig Anderman, founder and CEO of Ellie Mae, commented, "We recognize the critical role our services play in enabling our clients to serve their customers and deeply regret the inconvenience and delays they are experiencing. e performance and security of our platform is our No. 1 priority. We are doing everything within our power to restore full operations as soon as possible." Ellie Mae has hired Stroz Friedberg, a cyber- security and digital forensics firm, to look into the attack as well as any possible data or security breaches. e investigation of the attack is ongoing. Major metro areas with the highest percentage of resurfacing equity — between negative 10 percent and positive 10 percent — were Louisville, Ky., (37 percent), Columbia, S.C. (28 percent), Colorado Springs, Colo., (28 percent), Little Rock, Ark., (28 percent), and Tulsa, Okla., (27 percent), according to HousingViews/S&P Dow Jones Indices. KNOW THIS

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