Financial Fraud Fannie Mae Review of Fraud Schemes within Fannie Mae 1998-2004

Scope

The agency found the fraud understatements of earnings and illegal gratuities that led to accounting violations and inability to meet Wall Street goals.

The investigation of Lee Frakas, executive of a major mortgage company which had dealings with Fannie Mae with hundreds of fake mortgages. The Securities Exchange Commission cited that Fannie Mae had to repay earnings and correct their books for the period 2001 through 2004. This major undertaking will cost the company over $11 billion by SEC estimates. In addition the Department of Justice has conducted a criminal investigation on the board members.

Summary

The top executive managing Fannie Mae were found guilty of illegally reporting accounting information that led to their receiving million dollar payments. Under Fraudulent Financial Statement Schemes this case is one of corruption and financial fraud. The specific areas include Illegal Gratuities, Asset/Revenue Overstatements and Understatements. Accounting records were falsified to satisfy investing partners according to the OFHEO (Oversight Office of Federal Housing Enterprise). The result was a substantial fine of several million dollars (Associated Press, 2006). The investigation by the Oversight Office took nearly three years and the entire overstatement of financial reports totaled a staggering $11 billion dollars (Associated Press, 2006). The Security Exchange Commission also penalized Fannie Mae levying over $400 million dollars in civil fees that are to be repaid to investors. These extensive violations of accounting and financial reporting caused major damage to investors that contributed to nearly crippling of the U.S. Housing market which still has yet to recover.

Many of Fannie Mae's executive board leaders were removed from office in 2004 due to the charges brought against the federal mortgage company (Associated Press, 2006). Earnings were misstated by failure to report accurate numbers by the competing Freddie Mac for over $4 billion dollars...

This fraudulent reporting took place for over two years in the period from 2000 through 2002 (Associated Press, 2006).
The auditing committee for Fannie Mae was similarly removed from their positions and new members were hired to review all the accounting books from the late 1990s through 2008.

To add insult to injury $3 billion in fraud was uncovered as an executive at Fannie Mae, Samuel Smith found a loan that had been resold a second time from Bean & Whitaker, which is a Mortgage Company (Schoenberg, 2011). As a government authorized sponsor to cover mortgages, Fannie Mae had discovered a major problem involving Taylor Bean with hundreds more loans that were invalid and had no mortgage insurance coverage (Associated Press, 2006).

The main contact at Taylor Bean that setup these fraudulent deals was Lee Frakas, he was under investigation, however, Fannie Mae continued to accept bad loans.

Summary of Conclusions

In order to make corrections to the current practices in the accounting policies, audit procedures, and corporate structure, the company has agreed to hire in all new management and employees after dismissing all involved in the scandal. A cap has been placed on the amount of growth allowable which has been set at $720 billion (Associated Press, 2006). The number of executives and others dismissed from the company was more than forty. This included the CEO named Daniel Mudd, who is being reviewed by the SEC and may be charged with fines or other disciplinary action (Associated Press, 2006). Fannie Mae never plead guilty to any charges nor did they deny any allegations. Instead the company settled the matter out of court by submitting to a full investigation and agreement to abide by the SEC laws and avoid any further violations (Associated Press, 2006).

The appointed director for OFHEO reports that Fannie Mae was operating under a guise of being the 'best and safest risk in mortgage lending, when in fact it was a facade" says James Lockhart. The reports uncovered a culture where any thing goes as long as the result…