Thursday, November 05, 2009
Congress played health care fiddle while housing burned
A much-anticipated audit of the Federal Housing Administration was abruptly postponed just before it was supposed to be made public, after questions arose about its accuracy.Sure a bad time for this, particularly given Barney Frank's continuing headache with Fannie Mae.
The auditor, Integrated Financial Engineering, said it notified the F.H.A. late Tuesday that its computer models were creating unexplained inconsistencies. A news conference scheduled for Wednesday morning was canceled.
The delay came amid broad public concern about the financial condition of the F.H.A., and appeared likely to add to questions about whether the agency is running excessive risks with taxpayers� money.
Fannie Mae reported a net loss of $18.9 billion in the third quarter of 2009, compared with a loss of $14.8 billion in the second quarter of 2009. ... Third-quarter results were largely due to $22.0 billion of credit related expenses, reflecting the continued build of the company�s combined loss reserves and fair value losses associated with the increasing number of loans that were acquired from mortgage backed securities trusts in order to pursue loan modifications.Yup, another $15 billion going into Fannie to bail out the housing industry. Congress' answer? Keep more first-time homebuyer credits flowing. Damn the pusher man.
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As a result, on November 4, 2009, the Acting Director of the Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA) submitted a request for $15.0 billion from Treasury on the company�s behalf.
Labels: banking, economics, housing