Countrywide Financial Corp. said Tuesday that its October mortgage loan fundings fell 48 percent from a year earlier as the company continues to suffer from a sluggish housing market complicated by a worsening credit crunch.

The Calabasas-based mortgage lender said it funded $22 billion in loans during October, with average of daily applications dropping 34 percent to $1.8 billion.

“October’s operating results continue to be indicative of current market trends,” Chief Operating Officer David Sambol said in a statement.

The company’s pipeline for the month was $41 billion, compared with $61 billion a year ago and was about equal with September’s number of $42 billion.

However, total fundings for Countrywide were up 4 percent from September. Subprime fundings were 0.2 percent of total mortgage loan fundings in October, which is indicative of the company’s strategy to reduce its funding of the riskier loans.

The loan delinquency rate grew to 5.9 percent, up big from the 3.9 percent from the same time last year.

Countrywide added that commercial real estate funding slid 59 percent to $752 million for the month.

This all comes more than two weeks after the lender reported its first quarterly loss in 25 years but added that it plans to return to profitability as it cuts costs and regains traction.

Shares in Countrywide were up 2.1 percent Tuesday to $13.46 in afternoon trading on the New York Stock Exchange.