GSEs

The Consumer Mortgage Coalition is arguing that the bill has serious flaws by allowing private insurers to undercut pricing on federal flood insurance policies by offering high deductibles and exclusions to homeowners with mortgages guaranteed by the government-sponsored enterprises.

Going forward, Fannie Mae will be relying more on loan guarantee fee income from its single-family and multifamily businesses.

The Federal Housing Finance Agency announced Wednesday it had raised a cap on the amount of multifamily loans Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac can buy from lenders, boosting it to $35 billion effective immediately.

Industry groups are urging the Federal Housing Finance Agency to end the sweep of profits of the GSEs so that Fannie and Freddie can rebuild capital.

Freddie Mac won't make a dividend payment to the Treasury Department after declining interest rates and widening spreads on investments triggered a $354 million first-quarter loss for the mortgage finance giant.

WASHINGTON — The Federal Home Loan Bank of San Francisco has selected Greg Seibly to be its new president and chief executive starting May 12. He will take over from Dean Schultz, who is retiring after 25 years at the helm of the bank.

Senate Banking Committee Chairman Richard Shelby, R-Ala., is seeking input from the Government Accountability Office and the Congressional Budget Office on the future of policies dealing with Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.

Even while the FHFA finally embarked on a principal reduction plan, critics argued it was a dangerous idea that made Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac less safe while helping relatively few people.

FHFA Director Mel Watt acknowledged that the principal reduction program may seem "too small and too late."

Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac's experiments with selling credit risk to investors are a critical element of new plan to merge the two entities and move them out of conservatorship, but what form so-called credit risk transfers take could make a big difference.