Freddie Mac Sets Dates for Market Update and Release of 2005 Financial Results

MCLEAN, Va., March 10 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- Freddie Mac today announced that it will hold its quarterly market update conference call on March 30, 2006 and that it expects to release quarterly and full-year 2005 financial results in May. During the March 30 conference call, management will discuss the company's business and preliminary financial performance for 2005 and its expected financial reporting schedule and business outlook for 2006.

The company's reporting schedule for its 2005 results will allow management to implement a significant improvement in its method for determining the estimated fair values of its guarantee assets and guarantee obligations. The company recently determined to make greater use of third- party market information in its valuation methodology and is implementing this change in its 2005 financial statements as of the beginning of the year. This will be reflected as a change in estimate and significantly improves reliability and transparency in the valuation of these instruments. Management does not expect these enhancements to affect any of the company's previously released audited financial statements for 2004 and prior years.

"Our highest commitment is to the accuracy of our financial statements," said Gene McQuade, Freddie Mac's president and chief operating officer. "The goal of Freddie Mac's new management team is to build an infrastructure for the company that meets a high standard of excellence. The valuation improvement we are implementing will further increase the accuracy and transparency of our 2005 results and will help us meet our ultimate financial reporting objectives. We are committed to doing whatever it takes to make Freddie Mac an even stronger and better company."

"We have made substantial progress in fixing our financial reporting infrastructure, but our work is not done," said Martin F. Baumann, Freddie Mac's chief financial officer. "Getting this infrastructure to the point where it can support timely, reliable quarterly reporting continues to be an enormously complex task. Our efforts to accelerate our previously planned controls initiatives and implement reporting enhancements create short-term challenges, but we believe the long-term benefits of these improvements are substantial. We continue to work hard to strengthen our controls for financial reporting, and we continue to invest heavily both in systems and in the human resources we need."

The company's objective is to return to quarterly reporting, and file timely, GAAP-compliant, monthly capital reports with its primary regulator, the Office of Federal Housing Enterprise Oversight, by the end of this year. After the company resumes quarterly reporting, it will begin the process of registering its common stock with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The company's reporting schedule for 2006 will allow for the completion of the comprehensive review and remediation of internal controls that was previously announced. The company will discuss its progress toward these objectives in its March 30 conference call.

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The information in this press release is included in our Information Statement Supplement dated March 10, 2006, which will be posted on the Investor Relations page of our Web site.

Freddie Mac's press releases sometimes contain forward-looking statements. A description of factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from the expectations expressed in these and other forward-looking statements can be found in the company's Information Statement dated June 14, 2005 and related Information Statement Supplements, which are available on the Investor Relations page of the company's Web site at http://www.freddiemac.com/investors.

Freddie Mac is a stockholder-owned company established by Congress in 1970 to support homeownership and rental housing. Freddie Mac fulfills its mission by purchasing residential mortgages and mortgage-related securities, which it finances primarily by issuing mortgage-related securities and debt instruments in the capital markets. Over the years, Freddie Mac has made home possible for one in six homebuyers in America.