FANNIE MAE

The Obama administration's latest effort to boost the beleaguered housing market is likely to help mortgage insurers as lower defaults will boost their liquidity.

U.S. government-controlled mortgage finance companies Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae are working on a program to help independent mortgage banks get access to short-term credit needed to make home loans, the Wall Street Journal said, citing people familiar with the matter.

U.S. government-controlled mortgage finance companies Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae are working on a program to help independent mortgage banks get access to short-term credit needed to make home loans, the Wall Street Journal said, citing people familiar with the matter.

Fannie Mae, the largest U.S. home funding source, said on Wednesday it sold $2 billion of bills at rates unchanged from last week's rates for similar sizes and maturities.

U.S. mortgage rates held at their lowest level since late May in the latest week, low enough to continue to spur home loan demand and help the hard-hit U.S. housing market recover.

The Obama administration is expected to announce a program this week to aid low- and moderate-income U.S. housing markets by funding state housing agencies, officials said.

The U.S. Treasury plans to kick off a fresh $15 billion liquidity and mortgage bond purchase program to assist state finance agencies providing mortgages to low-income borrowers, Bloomberg said, citing a person familiar with the matter.

The chief financial officer of government-controlled mortgage finance company, Freddie Mac's, will start his new job with annual pay of up to $3.5 million and a nearly $2 million signing bonus, the company said in a regulatory filing late Thursday.

The New York Federal Reserve said on Friday it bought $1.970 billion of U.S. agency debt with maturities ranging from April 2016 to March 2019.

U.S. single-family home prices rose by a seasonally adjusted 0.3 percent in July from June but were 4.2 percent lower than a year earlier and 10.5 percent below their April 2007 peak, the Federal Housing Finance Agency said on Tuesday.

World stocks retreated further from last week's 11-month high on Monday as lower commodity prices and caution ahead of a Federal Reserve meeting and G20 summit prompted investors to trim risky trades.

Investors in U.S. mortgage bonds backed by the Federal Housing Administration own one of the safest bets on Wall Street, yet mounting defaults on the underlying collateral are seen posing risks.

The Federal Reserve bought $25.45 billion net of agency mortgage-backed securities in the latest week, the New York Fed said on its website on Thursday.

President Barack Obama is at New York's Federal Hall on Wall Street today where he is addressing leaders of the financial community in a speech.

Tepid demand for mortgage refinancing slowed the early repayment of most U.S. bonds backed by home loans in August, with the spring rush having run its course and unlikely to resume without new record low mortgage rates.

Stocks climbed on Friday as investors focused on the bright side of a mixed payrolls report that showed smaller-than-expected job cuts in August but also an unemployment rate that hit a 26-year high.

The U.S. Federal Housing Administration said on Friday it would not need a congressional subsidy even if mortgage-related losses push its reserves below a level demanded by Congress.

The U.S. Mortgage Bankers Association will call on Congress to transform U.S. government-controlled mortgage lenders Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac into several smaller privately held companies that would issue mortgage securities with a government guarantee, the Wall Street Journal reported.

The U.S. Mortgage Bankers Association said on Wednesday it will ask Congress to transform mortgage lenders Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac into several smaller, privately held companies that would issue mortgage securities with a government guarantee.

Shares of Citigroup Inc fell as much as 7.5 percent on Monday amid a broad slide in financial stocks, after rallying over the last week.

U.S. Federal Reserve officials are thinking carefully about tapering off their purchases of mortgage debt to push the $1.45 trillion program into next year rather than end it on Dec. 31 as planned.