After exiting the channel approximately three-and-a-half years ago during a tough period for both the mortgage industry and its own business, LoanDepot is returning to the wholesale origination business.

"Serving brokers through wholesale naturally expands our multi-channel origination strategy and complements our direct-to-consumer, in-market retail, joint venture, and servicing businesses," CEO Anthony Hsieh said in a press release. "By leveraging the existing shared services infrastructure of our joint venture channel, we are well positioned to scale this business and add a new source of profitable growth."

The decision to exit was announced in August 2022 during its earnings call when the company announced a second quarter loss of $224 million.

That was also the first call led by Frank Martell, who was hired as president and CEO that April. At the time, Hsieh became the executive chairman, but was pushed out of his day-to-day role at the company in February 2023 following a dispute with the company's board.

But a year ago, the company announced Hsieh would be returning as executive chairman of mortgage originations, while Martell would be departing the company come that June. Hsieh became acting CEO and then took the position full-time.

The wholesale channel across the mortgage industry has seen a resurgence in that time. At the end of 2020, mortgage brokers had a 13.5% share of the market, showed data from Boston Consulting Group, which it sourced from others, including the Mortgage Bankers Association.

By the second quarter of last year, this grew to 19%. At the same time, retail shrank to 51% from 64%.

This number may be an underestimation. Statements from UWM's Chairman and CEO Mat Ishbia in August put the mortgage broker share at around 30% and growing.

In August 2025, Dan Peña was promoted to LoanDepot's president of partnership lending. He will be directing the company's return to wholesale.

Matt Mancasola is returning to LoanDepot as vice president of wholesale lending. Most recently, he was a regional production manager at Nations Direct Mortgage, his LinkedIn profile said.

Prior to that, Mancasola was managing director, western division wholesale at Homepoint. His previous tenure at LoanDepot was as a regional sales manager between June 2021 and July 2022, and for over nine years before then, he was a division vice president at Caliber Home Loans.

In 2021, the last full year of wholesale production, LoanDepot's partner channel, which included not just the mortgage broker business, but joint ventures with homebuilders and depositories, did $28.3 billion at a 138 basis point margin. While the volume was higher than 2020's $20.5 billion, the margin for that year was 306 basis points.

A note in the earnings press release for the fourth quarter of 2021 said its margins were "adversely impacted" by competitive pressures from larger wholesale focused lenders.

During the second quarter of 2022, the partner channel did $5.1 billion, with margins of 145 basis points; it had similar volume in the first quarter, but the margin was just 107 basis points. It said the higher margins was because of a shift towards the joint venture volume and away from brokers.

LoanDepot is scheduled to release its fourth quarter and full year results on March 10. The third quarter 2025 report found its net loss narrowed to $8.7 million from $25.3 million in the second quarter, but worse than a $2.7 million net profit for the third quarter of 2024.

LoanDepot's total volume of $6.5 billion was down from $6.7 billion in the second quarter and $6.66 billion for the third quarter of 2024. The results did not break out which origination source the loans came from.

On a day when the Dow Jones Industrial Average fell another 385 points by 12:30 p.m. due to oil prices spiking from the Iran conflict, LoanDepot's stock price increased by almost 2% from its previous close to $1.805 per share.

UWM Holdings, the parent of the nation's largest originator United Wholesale Mortgage, was down by 2% to $3.78 per share. Rocket, the next largest wholesaler, was up 0.8% on the day so far, to $15.06 per share. Of the mortgage and related industry stocks which National Mortgage News tracks, the only other lenders higher on the day were Better, up 9.2%; Figure, up 5%; and Rithm, up 1.1%, with mortgage insurer Enact up just under 0.2%.