Mish points out that if the gov’t bails out FMN bonds, it will be a transfer of wealth from the U.S. tax payer to overseas governments such as China and Japan and also to sophisticated investors.
U.S. Taxpayer Bailout of China Over Fannie Mae
If the US bails out Fannie Mae bonds as suggested in We’re All Homeowners Now, Nationalization of Fannie, Freddie Unavoidable, inquiring minds just might be wondering "Who is the biggest beneficiary?".
It’s a good question too. Please consider Chinese Government is Top Foreign Holder of Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac Bonds.
As politicians call for taxpayer bailouts and a government takeover of troubled mortgage lenders Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae, FreedomWorks would like to point out that a bailout is a transfer of possibly hundreds of billions of U.S. tax dollars to sophisticated investors and governments overseas.
The top five foreign holders of Freddie and Fannie long-term debt are China, Japan, the Cayman Islands, Luxembourg, and Belgium. In total foreign investors hold over $1.3 trillion in these agency bonds, according to the U.S. Treasury’s most recent "Report on Foreign Portfolio Holdings of U.S. Securities."
FreedomWorks President Matt Kibbe commented, "The prospectus for every GSE bond clearly states that it is not backed by the United States government. That’s why investors holding agency bonds already receive a significant risk premium over Treasuries."
"A bailout at this stage would be the worst possible outcome for American taxpayers and mortgage holders, who have been paying a risk premium to these foreign investors. It would change the rules of the game retroactively and would directly subsidize the risks taken by sophisticated foreign investors."
"A bailout of GSE bondholders would be perhaps the greatest taxpayer rip-off in American history. It is bad economics and you can be sure it is terrible politics."
There is $376 Billion in Chinese Agency Bond Holdings Subject to Taxpayer Bailout Proposals According to FreedomWorks Analysts.
If China and Japan were dumb enough to invest in US agencies (and they were), then China and Japan should suffer the consequences, not US taxpayers.
