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Five Takeaways from Treasury Secretary Jack Lew’s Testimony Before Congress

microphone [1]During his testimony this week before the full House Financial Services Committee [2], U.S. Department of Treasury [3] Secretary Jack Lew stated when asked about GSEs and the conservatorship that the system should be restructured, but the time was not right for the conservatorship to end.

Lew was testifying before the House Financial Services Committee on the 2015 Annual Report of the Financial Stability Oversight Council (FSOC). When questioned by Representative Ed Royce (R-California), who has been a strong advocate of ending the FHFA's conservatorship of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac and paying GSE dividends to taxpayers instead of Treasury, Lew said he thought GSE reform should take place, but disagreed as to the ending of the conservatorship.

"The damage done to our economy by the housing crisis was far more than the simple amount of money that was put into the GSEs, and I think Americans are still healing from the pain of that financial crisis," Lew said. "I think the right thing is to do GSE reform and to get on to a new restructured system, but it is not the right time to be talking about ending the conservatorship or paying dividends."

Here are five takeaways from the hearing titled "The Annual Report of the Financial Stability Oversight Council":

Click here [4] for the archived webcast of the hearing.