Bernanke's bright idea: $1 million federal mortgage insurance

Joseph Lazzaro — Fri, 09 Nov 2007 10:50:00 EST

Filed under: Good news, Federal Natl Mtge (FNM), Housing, Federal Reserve

Anyone who has sat through a U.S. Congressional hearing -- present company included -- will tell you that the hearings are often 99% exasperation and 1% illumination.

Hours of each session can go by without hearing anything voters/readers really need to know about. Still, every once in a while, up pops something imaginative, sometimes even involving a topic that wasn't intended to be the focus of the hearing.

Such an event occurred Thursday during U.S. Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke's testimony before the U.S. Congress' Joint Economic Committee.

Bernanke, responding to a question from U.S. Senator and Committee Chairman Charles Schumer (D-New York) on the federal government's $417,000 insurance cap on mortgages, suggested that Congress could consider allowing Fannie Mae (NYSE: FNM) and Freddie Mac (NYSE: FRE), under a temporary plan, to buy mortgages up to $1 million from banks and mortgage companies, pay the U.S. Government a fee for having the federal government guarantee them, then turn them into securities to be sold as investments.

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Bernanke's bright idea: $1 million federal mortgage insurance originally appeared on BloggingStocks on Fri, 09 Nov 2007 10:50:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Fed analysis: Fed may be done cutting rates

Joseph Lazzaro — Wed, 31 Oct 2007 16:35:00 EST

Filed under: Earnings Reports, Other Issues, Citigroup Inc. (C), Bank of America (BAC), Wachovia Corp (WB), Housing, Federal Reserve

With its quarter-percentage point cut Wednesday in the fed funds rate to 4.50% and the discount rate to 5.00%, the Fed appeared to tilt slightly against another interest rate cut in December.

In its statement, the Fed said "economic growth was solid in the third quarter" and that strains on financial markets had eased somewhat on balance. The Fed added that today's action "combined with the policy action taken in September, should help forestall some of the adverse effects on the broader economy."

Fed Analysis: The above suggests that Chairman Ben Bernanke and the Fed are laying the groundwork for an end to the Fed's brief easing of monetary policy, if in fact the U.S. economy grows at an acceptable rate or inflation accelerates. The economy has slowed through 2007, but on Tuesday Q3 GDP unexpectedly accelerated to 3.9%, the U.S. Commerce Department announced, up from 3.8% in Q2. It's quite likely Tuesday's Q3 GDP statistic influenced the Fed -- swiping away any notion of a half-percentage-point, or 50 basis point, reduction in short-term rates. Further, while monetary policy doves will argue that the sub-prime mortgage and sluggish housing sector headwinds remain, monetary policy hawks -- or those who believe the Fed does not need to cut rates further -- can argue that the Fed has two GDP data points, Q2 and Q3, which indicate that the U.S. economy is growing at a sufficient rate, and that the Fed can now keep interest rates where they are, absent new evidence of a slowing economy, in the quarters ahead.

Fed analysis: Fed may be done cutting rates originally appeared on BloggingStocks on Wed, 31 Oct 2007 16:35:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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