WASHINGTON — The chief executive of mortgage finance company Freddie Mac intends to step down within the next year after just over two years on the job, a federal housing regulator said Wednesday.
Freddie Mac CEO Charles E. Haldeman informed the company's board that he plans to step down "some time in the coming year," the Federal Housing Finance Agency said in a statement.
Haldeman has been CEO of Freddie Mac since August 2009. He is the third chief executive to run Freddie since Richard F. Syron was pushed out of the job in September 2008, when the government seized Freddie and its larger sibling Fannie Mae. A spokeswoman for McLean, Va., Freddie Mac declined to comment.
The government's rescue of the two firms has cost $141 billion to date. David Moffett, Haldeman's predecessor, quit abruptly after just six months in the post over his frustration with having a federal regulator call the shots.
"Ed Haldeman has brought strong leadership to Freddie Mac," said Edward DeMarco, acting director of the FHFA. "I appreciate his commitment to leadership stability during the upcoming transition."
Freddie Mac has seen heavy turnover at the executive ranks since the company was taken over by the government three years ago. When Haldeman was hired, he said he entered the job with "eyes wide open" to the fact that he would be firmly under the thumb of federal regulators. He had previously led Putman Investments, the mutual-fund manager, in the aftermath a trading abuse scandal.
The housing regulator also said two Freddie Mac board members, John Koskinen and Robert Glauber, will step down in February. Koskinen also served as CEO after Moffett's departure.
Freddie Mac named Christopher Lynch, a retired executive at KPMG LLP, as the company's new chairman, the housing regulator said.
Another board member, Laurence Hirsch, also told the regulator that he doesn't intend to seek re-elecction.
