Fannie, Freddie on Geithner's to-do list

June 5, 2010 - 0 comments

Washington -- U.S. Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner said the Federal National Mortgage Association and the Federal Home Loan Mortgage Corp. are next on his to-do list.

The struggling government-sponsored mortgage lenders, known as Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, have been in government conservatorship and surviving with federal lines of credit since September 2008, having hemorrhaged huge losses during the subprime mortgage market meltdown.

In an interview, Geithner said the financial regulatory reform package, currently under review by a joint House and Senate committee, was his top priority for the moment. After that, Geithner said, "we're going to move on reform of Fannie and Freddie and the broader housing finance system."

He predicted Congress would act "quickly" to reform the two mortgage behemoths that buy bundled mortgage securities and, thereby, set the tone for lending in the housing market.

Geithner said, "We certainly welcome the broad support we've heard from Republicans and Democrats about the need to go forward on reform."

The Treasury Department would turn its attention to Fannie and Freddie "as soon as we get this (regulatory) bill passed," he said.