Fannie Mae Files $15.8 Billion in Claims in Lehman Bankruptcy (Bloomberg.com)

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By Dawn Kopecki and Jody Shenn

Nov. 6 (Bloomberg) -- Fannie Mae, the money-losing mortgage-finance company seized by regulators, said it has $15.8 billion in claims against bankrupt securities firm Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. that it will at best partially recover.

“Based on Lehman Brothers’ financial condition, we believe we will only receive a portion of these claims,” Washington- based Fannie Mae said in a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission yesterday. The announcement came as the company posted its ninth-straight quarterly loss, of $18.9 billion, and said it will need $15 billion more in federal aid.

This is the first time Fannie Mae has quantified its exposure to derivatives and trading agreements with New York- based Lehman, an underwriter of mortgage bonds that succumbed to the subprime home-loan crisis Sept. 15, 2008, with what was the biggest bankruptcy filing in history. Fannie Mae’s claims would make it the fifth-largest creditor, according to a list maintained by Epiq Systems, Lehman’s claims’ administrator.

Fannie Mae said in a bankruptcy filing last year that Lehman, once the fourth-largest U.S. investment bank, owed it “very substantial sums.”

Fannie Mae, which was seized by regulators about a week before Lehman’s bankruptcy because of questions about its capital reserves, did record $811 million in losses on the Lehman agreements for the third quarter of 2008. Fannie Mae hasn’t disclosed any losses stemming from the Lehman bankruptcy so far this year, according to securities filings.
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more: http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&sid=aTDOQtaju7rI&pos=7