Matt Levine’s Money Stuff: Fannie and Freddie Stakes Are High

Fannie and Freddie

The capital structures of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac are a little complicated, but here’s roughly the situation :

• Fannie and Freddie have total assets of $7.8 trillion ($4.4 trillion for Fannie, $3.4 trillion for Freddie) and liabilities of $7.6 trillion ($4.3 trillion, $3.3 trillion).
• This leaves them with total net worth (shareholders’ equity, assets minus liabilities) of $160.7 billion ($98.3 billion, $62.4 billion).
• The US government has a $348.4 billion senior preferred claim on that net worth ($216.2 billion, $132.2 billion).
• After the US government, there are regular preferred-stock holders with $33.2 billion of preferred claims ...