WASHINGTON — Former Freddie Mac CEO Donald Layton has joined the Harvard Joint Center for Housing Studies as a senior industry fellow focused on housing finance reform, following his resignation from the company on Monday.
Layton, who joined Freddie as CEO in 2012, has spent more than 40 years in the financial services industry, holding roles at JPMorgan Chase and Mastercard, among others.
His tenure at Freddie was marked by “making the companies work well in conservatorship,” from increasing credit risk transfer initiatives to increasing the government-sponsored enterprise’s profitability, he said
Michael Stegman, the former senior policy adviser for housing at the National Economic Council during the Obama administration, will also join the Harvard Joint Center for Housing Studies as a senior fellow, where he will comment on Democratic presidential candidates’ housing policy proposals, said Chris Herbert, the center’s managing director, in a blog post.
“I am very pleased to have both Don and Mike affiliated with the Center over the coming year to share their expertise and their views,” said Herbert. “Given the profound importance of the housing system in helping to make housing available and affordable — not to mention in determining the health and stability of the macroeconomy — I’m hopeful that our fellows will make a significant, positive contribution to this year’s burgeoning policy debate.”
The center intends to contribute to the housing finance reform debate as efforts within the Trump administration heat up, beginning with a presidentially directed report expected this summer from the Treasury Department and the Department of Housing and Urban Development on solutions for ending the conservatorship of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac and modernizing the nation’s housing system.
