Thornburg posts $140 mln profit in Q3

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Thornburg Mortgage Inc TMA.N, a specialist in jumbo home loans, posted on Monday a net profit in the third quarter, boosted by a decrease in the value of some liabilities.

The Santa Fe, New Mexico-based company posted a third-quarter profit of $140.0 million, or $1.23 per diluted share, against a loss of $1.1 billion, or $89.41 a year earlier, when it was hammered by the sale of jumbo mortgages.

It said earnings were impacted by a $654.7 million loss on impairment of its MBS portfolio due to further declines in the MBS fair value pricesas well as a $594.6 million fair value gain related to senior subordinated secured notes due in 2015.

Thornburg specializes in mortgages above $417,000 to borrowers with good credit. It ran short of capital as investors stopped buying its loans.

The company ended September with $26.3 billion in assets.

(Reporting by Juan Lagorio; Editing by Kazunori Takada)