Fannie Mae-No Politics (FNMA)

[RickNagra]

Third option sounds great to me.

From TH on the current administrations options: "First of all, I’m sure the Court felt no need to address the implications for ending Fannie and Freddie’s conservatorships when it made its ruling on the APA and constitutional issues. On the issue of political cover, I don’t know how the Biden administration will think about that. Right now it’s in “no man’s land.” The Trump administration began a recap and release process with the January letter agreement suspending the sweep indefinitely (while continuing the liquidation preference indefinitely as well–a fact whose significance seemed to have escaped the Justices when they claimed this suspension mooted the request for a prospective remedy). But with the loss at SCOTUS, you now have two companies who are allowed to build their earnings but have no hope of accessing the capital markets because all of their past accumulated earnings belong to Treasury. As I noted elsewhere, the Biden administration has three ways it can undo this knot: (a) nationalize Fannie and Freddie, and keep the right to their income stream in perpetuity, as it now has with the liquidation preference, (b) “wind them down and replace them” (and we know how past attempts to do that turned out, or (c) deem the senior preferred to be fully paid, cancel the liquidation preference, and release them. My bet is the third option, and their “cover” for that would be to declare that this is the best public policy for the mortgage market, and the nation."