Investing Opinion

Cramer: The Fannie/Freddie Bailout's Good News

 

It would be very easy for me to say something like this about the federal government's plan for Fannie Mae (FNM) and Freddie Mac (FRE): "The plan is a joke, it will mean nothing, the taxpayers are going to be stung and the market should be sold aggressively."

In fact, I feel like writing that. I feel like writing it because it is fun and simple and consistent with pretty much everything else every "intellectual" and "thoughtful" person was saying.

But then I reach back to my writings from last Thursday and Friday , which asked the bears if anything good could happen and what to buy and everyone was pretty scornful or ignored me. Even as the Bank Index (BKX) turned out to be a home run to buy.

So, I am urging, without any prejudice, that bears DO NOT READ ANY FURTHER. Just join the "Jim Cramer is a Moron Club" and go switch on some football, because here is what I have to say about the Treasury plan:

It is what I have been calling for. It is what I have wanted. So I can't turn around now, even as I have been the world's most vocal critic of the Treasury, and that it's bad.

I will first put, in plain English, what I believe this plan will help do (the operative word is help, as opposed to hinder).

  1. It will help stop the root of all financial evil right now, house price depreciation.
  2. It will make mortgage money cheaper and more readily available.
  3. It will slow the rate of foreclosures.
  4. It will, if done right, not cost the taxpayer anything and could actually return money to Treasury through the preferred and common stock that the government is buying.

Now, let's try to pick each one of these apart, using the traditional "Cramer-is-a-moron Socratic Dialogue" between a hypothetical Cramer basher and me:

Jim Basher (JB): Jim, nothing can stop house-price depreciation because there are too many homes for sale and the demand isn't there.

Jim Cramer: Actually, we are building 60% fewer homes than we did two years ago and while the unsold inventory is up to 1991 levels -- highest in 17 years -- we have 40 MILLION More people than then, so it ain't so bad. The demand can catch up to supply if supply is shrinking and demand is pent-up.

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