Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac: Turning the American Dream into a Nightmare

About the Book

This book is available as open access through the Bloomsbury Open Access programme and is available on www.bloomsburycollections.com.

This book examines the role of Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac and other key players in the American mortgage market, in precipitating the current global financial crisis. From President Clinton's announcement of the 'National Home Ownership Strategy' in 1995 to its collapse in 2008, this book deftly explains the aims and consequences of extending mortgage lending to people who could not afford home ownership. Bankers, investment banks, rating agencies and derivatives have all been awarded their share of the blame, while politicians, regulators and government agencies have successfully avoided theirs. Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac have been implicated, but the true story of their marriage made in hell has never been told.

Table of Contents:

Acknowledgements

Introduction

Timeline

Chapter 1. The Seeds are Sown.

Chapter 2. Two More Tools in the Toolkit.

Chapter 3. The Role of the Housing and Urban Development Department.

Chapter 4 Mortgage Data.

Chapter 5. The 'Mission Regulator' for Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac

Chapter 6. The GSEs and the Developing Crisis.

Chapter 7. The Dominance of the GSEs.

Chapter 8. The Beginning of the End for Freddie Mac

Chapter 9. The Beginning of the End for Fannie Mae

Chapter 10. The Years 2005 to 2007. Drinking in the Last Chance Saloon.

Chapter 11. The Subprime Market Grew and Grew and No One Knew

Chapter 12. Why did Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac get away with it for so long?

Chapter 13. The End Cometh.

Chapter 14. What Next?

Appendix 1

Abbreviations

Bibliography

Index

About the Author :
Oonagh McDonald is a former UK Member of Parliament and an international regulatory expert

Review :
It is astonishing and somewhat unsettling that the best scholarly work about Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac and their role in the 2008 financial crisis should have produced by Oonagh McDonald, a British student of the financial markets. The book is doubly useful because Ms McDonald cannot be accused of bias on an issue that has become excessively politicized in the US. If you want to know how US government housing policy led to the financial crisis, it is in these pages. Finally, an accurate portrayal of the causes of the 2008 financial crisis... Ms. McDonald lays out how good intentions and contributory negligence of political power-players converted the American Dream from a reward for hard work into an entitlement for those who failed. More than any book I have read on the financial crisis, this captures the perils of politically driven lending. Oonagh McDonald shows how ideology, in this case a misplaced belief that home ownership is always good, deterred both public scrutiny of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac and market discipline. Supposed regulators became cheer-leaders and executives lined their pockets in the name of the American dream. And it remains unclear whether the monsters at the heart of the sub-prime crisis - now in state care - will be killed off, as this book rightly suggests they should be. The collapse of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac was a crucial part of the Great Meltdown in financial markets. Dr McDonald has now traced with great care and accomplished expertise the story behind this saga. Her meticulous research and her clarity in telling the story will be a great help to all readers in understanding what happened and why. I recommend this book highly to all who are in any way interested in the events of the Great Meltdown. There could be no better guide through the sub-prime crisis which triggered the great financial and economic collapse of 2008 than Oonagh McDonald. She possesses all the gifts - financial acumen and experience, an insider's knowledge of politics and government and the forensic talents of a top flight scholar. This book will endure as long as the fall of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac is remembered A serious study and done in enough depth to appeal to academics and researchers but ... accessible enough to appeal to the general public given the obvious importance of the topic. Her practical knowledge of politics and financial services is very illuminating throughout. Thorough and interesting and written with very perceptive insights from an experienced politician and regulator. From any perspective the current financial crisis should interest both practitioners and academics, there is much to learn and digest, and Oonagh's book will provide invaluable insights for many generations to come. It is highly readable and contains a wonderful blend of thorough scholarship and a detailed appreciation of the intertwining of politics and markets. Oonagh has laid bare the root causes of the subprime crisis and she highlights the dangers of politicians interfering in markets they do not understand. This is a thought provoking book and a timely reminder that markets and their specific politics always need close scrutiny if untold costs are to be avoided. The McDonald book is remarkable for its relentless focus on the effects of a low-income lending ideology as a cause of the financial crisis... we are blessed with a thorough and clear-eyed view that could only be brought to the issue by a scholar looking in from outside. In this thoroughly researched, practically definitive tome, the author 's story of the American dream turned nightmare could hardly be more different than Obama's version. Oonagh McDonald has produced a book that is scholarly and comprehensive, but at the same time, despite the complexity of the subject-matter, lucid and eminently readable.