By Mark Pittman and Bob Ivry
Sept. 25 (Bloomberg) -- The Federal Reserve decided to keep pumping $1.25 trillion of new money into the mortgage market to focus on rescuing the U.S. economy as the financial system revives and banks ask for less help.
The Fed is allowing some of the 10 support programs it created or expanded after the credit crisis began in August 2007 to expire or shrink. That caused the first decline in the amount of money the U.S. has committed on behalf of taxpayers to end the recession, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.
The central bank has purchased $694 billion of mortgage- backed securities since January and plans to spend $556 billion more by April 2010 to keep interest rates down. The debt-buying is the biggest program in the Fed’s arsenal.
“The first thing the Fed had to do was stop the bleeding in the banking system,” said Richard Yamarone, director of economic research at Argus Research Corp. in New York. “Now that that seems to have been accomplished, they’re focusing on the economy by buying mortgage-backed securities.”
The purchases were scheduled to stop at the end of December. The Federal Open Market Committee decided on Sept. 23 to continue the program through the first quarter of next year and slow the pace of buying to “promote a smooth transition in markets,” the committee said in a statement. It also said the economy has “picked up.”
9.4 Percent Decline
The debt-buying pushed the average 30-year mortgage interest rate this week to 5.04 percent, its lowest since May, according to McLean, Virginia-based Freddie Mac. The debt is guaranteed by Freddie Mac and the other government-sponsored home-loan financiers, Fannie Mae and Ginnie Mae, both based in Washington.
The U.S. has lent, spent or guaranteed $11.6 trillion to bolster banks and fight the longest recession in 70 years, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.
That’s a 9.4 percent decline since March 31, when Bloomberg last calculated the total at $12.8 trillion.
The tally “ignores the fact that virtually all commitments are backed by assets,” Andrew S. Williams, a Treasury Department spokesman who had the same role at the Federal Reserve Bank of New York until earlier this year, said in an e- mail. “The Federal Reserve’s current ‘outlays’ are largely in the form of secured loans. The aggregate value of the collateral backing those loans exceeds the loan value. These are not ‘outlays.’”
Refused to Identify
Spokesmen Calvin A. Mitchell of the New York Fed and David Skidmore of the Fed in Washington declined to comment.
The Fed has refused to identify the collateral backing its loans. Bloomberg News parent Bloomberg LP, the New York-based company majority-owned by Mayor Michael Bloomberg, sued the central bank in November to force it to provide the information. U.S. District Judge Loretta A. Preska gave the Fed until Sept. 30 to appeal her decision requiring more disclosure about the financial institutions that have benefited.
The Standard & Poor’s 500 Financials Index has risen 143 percent since its low on March 6, including a 179 percent increase in share price for JPMorgan Chase & Co. to $44.37 and a 142 percent jump for Goldman Sachs Group Inc. to $183.06.
Among the U.S. programs that have expired is the Treasury guarantee of money market mutual fund deposits, instituted a year ago to stem an investor run the week after Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc.’s collapse. The department said it collected $1.2 billion in fees from funds before the effort concluded on Sept. 18 and never paid out a claim.
Gas Guzzlers
The $3 billion “cash for clunkers,” which gave people rebates for trading in gas-guzzling vehicles, ended in August after 700,000 vehicles were sold, according to the U.S. Department of Transportation.
The Fed’s Money Market Investor Funding Facility, or MMIFF, is slated to be closed on Oct. 30, and four other Fed programs with a total limit of $2.5 trillion are scheduled to expire in February. Others have been cut back.
The central bank said Sept. 24 it will reduce the Term Securities Lending Facility to $50 billion from $75 billion and the Term Auction Facility, once $900 billion, will shrink to $50 billion. Support for commercial paper, short-term loans that corporations and banks use to pay everyday expenses, has fallen to $1.2 trillion as the market fell from a one-year peak of $1.8 trillion in January.
64 Percent Higher
Banks have repaid about $70.6 billion of the $204.6 billion in direct aid extended through the Capital Purchase Program of the Troubled Asset Relief Program, or TARP. Congress created the $700 billion fund last October.
The $70.6 billion includes $25 billion from New York-based JPMorgan Chase, one of the biggest recipients, and $28 million from Novato, California-based Bank of Marin Bancorp, one of the smallest, according to the Treasury and regulatory filings.
“Because financial conditions have started to improve, Treasury has already begun the process of exiting from some emergency programs,” the TARP administrator, Herb Allison, told the Senate Banking Committee Sept. 24. “It will, however, be some time before all CPP participants have fully extinguished their obligations to the taxpayers.”
The Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. said its Temporary Liquidity Guarantee Program has generated more than $9 billion in fees.
The combined commitments of the Fed and government agencies are 57 percent higher than on Nov. 24, when Bloomberg’s first tally was $7.4 trillion.
“We’re not self-sustaining yet,” William O’Donnell, head of Treasury strategy for RBS Securities Inc. in Stamford, Connecticut, said in an interview.
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--- Amounts (Billions)---
Limit Current
===========================================================
Total $11,563.65 $3,025.27
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Federal Reserve Total $5,870.65 $1,590.11
Primary Credit Discount $110.74 $28.51
Secondary Credit $1.00 $0.58
Primary dealer and others $147.00 $0.00
ABCP Liquidity $145.89 $0.08
AIG Credit $60.00 $38.81
Commercial Paper program $1,200.00 $42.44
Maiden Lane (Bear Stearns assets) $29.50 $26.19
Maiden Lane II (AIG assets) $22.50 $14.66
Maiden Lane III (AIG assets) $30.00 $20.55
Term Securities Lending $75.00 $0.00
Term Auction Facility $375.00 $196.02
Securities lending overnight $10.42 $9.25
Term Asset-Backed Loans (TALF) $1,000.00 $41.88
Currency Swaps/Other Assets $606.00 $59.12
GSE Debt Purchases $200.00 $129.21
GSE Mortgage-Backed Securities $1,250.00 $693.60
Citigroup Bailout Fed Portion $220.40 $0.00
Bank of America Bailout $87.20 $0.00
Commitment to Buy Treasuries $300.00 $289.22
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FDIC Total $2,477.50 $356.00
Public-Private Investment (PPIP)$1,000.00 0.00
Temporary Liquidity Guarantees* $1,400.00 $301.00
Guaranteeing GE Debt $65.00 $55.00
Citigroup Bailout, FDIC Share $10.00 $0.00
Bank of America Bailout, FDIC Share $2.50 $0.00
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HUD Total $306.00 $3.25
Hope for Homeowners (FHA) $300.00 $3.20
Neighborhood Stabilization (FHA) $6.00 $0.05
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* The program has generated $9.3 billion in income,
according to the agency.
Glossary: ABCP -- Asset-backed commercial paper AIG -- American International Group Inc. FDIC -- Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. FHA -- Federal Housing Administration, a division of HUD GE -- General Electric Co. GSE -- Government-sponsored enterprises (Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac and Ginnie Mae) HUD -- U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development TARP -- Troubled Asset Relief Program
Breakout of TARP funds:
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--- Amounts (Billions)---
Outlay Returned
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Total $447.76 $75.33
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Capital Purchase Program $204.55 $70.56
General Motors, Chrysler $79.97 $2.14
American International Group $69.84 $0.00
Making Home Affordable Program $23.40 $1.13
Targeted Investment Bank of America $20.00 $0.00
Targeted Investment Citigroup $20.00 $0.00
Term Asset-Backed Loan (TALF) $20.00 $0.00
Citigroup Bailout $5.00 $0.00
Auto Suppliers $5.00 $1.50
To contact the reporters on this story: Mark Pittman in New York at mpittman@bloomberg.net; Bob Ivry in New York at bivry@bloomberg.net.
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