Executive Openings Filled at Freddie Mac
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Wednesday, August 19, 2009
After struggling for the better part of the year to create an enduring management team, Freddie Mac is finally rounding out its top ranks.
The federally controlled mortgage-finance giant's new chief executive, Charles E. Haldeman Jr., started last week. And on Tuesday, the McLean company announced that longtime Wall Street mortgage specialist Bruce M. Witherell would be the new chief operating officer. That leaves the position of chief financial operating officer open.
Until last week, interim chief executive John Koskinen was playing the role of chief executive, chief financial officer and chief operating officer. He came in when the government-picked chief executive, David Moffett, resigned amid disagreements with the company's regulator. The company was further buffeted by the death of acting Chief Financial Officer David Kellermann in April.
Freddie Mac had trouble filling the top spots, as potential hires expressed concern about the uncertainty over the company's future and its ability to pay executives competitively. The company -- like its counterpart, D.C.-based Fannie Mae -- is operating in a kind of limbo, backstopped by the federal government and overseen by a regulator. New hires must be approved by the company's board and the regulator, the Federal Housing Finance Agency.
"There are many businesspeople for whom that would not be attractive," Haldeman said in an interview. "I was excited about the mission of Freddie Mac and was excited about the opportunity to lead five or six thousand people who had been through some tough experiences."
Witherell, who was a top mortgage executive at Morgan Stanley and Lehman Brothers, will oversee broad swaths of Freddie Mac's business. "The tougher the management challenge, the more I'm intrigued by it," he said.
Haldeman will earn a salary of $900,000 plus other potential compensation depending on decisions by the regulator and the Treasury Department. Witherell will earn a salary of $700,000 plus other potential compensation as well.
A veteran of the mortgage industry for about 30 years, Witherell said Freddie's troubles of the past few years seem to be easing. "I see us at a leveling-off point," he said. "We need to work very hard to calibrate where our business should stand today but also be part of the discussion of where the business will be in the next couple of years."
