Freddie, Fannie and all that

Here are some interesting statistics, particularly if you think that Fannie and Freddie had little or nothing to do with the mortgage mess.

Mortgage finance giant Freddie Mac (Federal Home Loan Mortgage Corporation) was founded in 1970. Along with Fannie Mae (Federal National Mortgage Association), the 2 government-sponsored enterprises owned or guaranteed $5.3 trillion of mortgages (out of $10.5 trillion nationwide) as of 12/31/08. Freddie Mac lost more money during the 2 years of 2007-08 (a $53 billion loss) than it made during the 36 years from 1971-2006 ($42 billion of profits) (source: USA Today, Wall Street Journal and Federal Reserve).

From "By the numbers" published by Sun Life.