Real Estate, Bank Bailout | featured news

Fannie Mae earned $17.2 billion last year, the biggest annual profit in the U.S. mortgage giant's history, helped by a record fourth quarter.

The Treasury said on Friday it is changing the way Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac will repay taxpayers in a move the Obama administration said would accelerate the winding down of the government-owned mortgage financiers.

Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, the two mortgage-finance giants, this week reported some of their best quarterly results since the real estate collapse. On Wednesday, Fannie Mae posted second-quarter net income of $5.1 billion. That is up from $2.7 billion in the first quarter of this year and an improvement from a net loss of $2.9 billion in the second quarter of last year. Fannie requested no additional money from the Treasury and said it would pay a $2.9 billion dividend to taxpayers.

The government-backed mortgage financier said it made a profit in the first quarter and that it does not need additional bailout money — a first since the federal government took it over in 2008.

U.S. mortgage giant Fannie Mae made money in the first three months of the year and is not seeking additional federal aid. It's the first time the company has reported a net income gain since it was taken over by the government during the 2008 financial crisis....

Fannie Mae said it will request $4.6 billion more in government aid after posting a $2.41 billion fourth-quarter loss.

Mortgage finance giant Freddie Mac FMCC.OB said on Monday it would ask for an additional $1.5 billion from taxpayers due to losses stemming from the weak housing market.

The housing and mortgage markets aren't likely to improve much over the next year, which will make it harder for the government to reduce its support of the sector, Freddie Mac's chief executive said on Monday.

That figure, projected through 2013, represents a worst-case scenario that assumes a double-dip recession, the Federal Housing Finance Agency says. The finance giants have so far received about $148 billion in taxpayer funds.

A grand jury has indicted the chief executive of what was once among the nation's largest independent home-loan providers on 16 counts of bank, securities and wire fraud.