Australian Finance Group yesterday priced its first residential mortgage backed securities issue for 2017. AFG chief executive officer David Bailey said this latest transaction was the largest term deal his company had undertaken.The top rated tranches were both rated AAAsf by S&P and Fitch. The A$65 million A1 and $250 million A2 notes were priced at 70 basis points and 120 basis points over the bank bill swap rate, respectively. (See table, right, for full pricing, credit support and weighted average details of all tranches.)"The securitisation program is an important contributor to the company's overall growth strategy," Bailey said.Bailey noted that a very positive aspect of the transaction was the increase in the number of returning investors, as well as a number of new investors to the AFG programme."By being able to source competitively priced funding from a variety of investors we can, in turn, provide competitively priced products to Australian consumers," he said.The transaction, comprising seven tranches and sellers notes that will be retained by the issuer, will settle on 7 September 2017.Prior transactions include a $300 million RMBS issuance in 2016, a $300 million issue in 2014 and a further two issues in 2013 of $245 million and $300 million, respectively.The latest transaction, the AFG 2017-1 Trust RMBS, was arranged by Australia and New Zealand Banking Group. Joint lead managers were National Australia Bank and ANZ.