The government needs to help turn subprime dollars into prime

Sir Saskia Scholtes writes that the "Helping hand could prolong subprime pain", December 22, and though she argues it well it really does not have to be that way, if the helping hand knows how to help.

Let us suppose that a subprime borrower has a set amount of dollars that he could pay to service his mortgage. In the financial markets, because of discounting of risks, the worth of that dollar cash flow is much lower if it is classified as a subprime lending operation than whether it is viewed as coming from a prime operation. And here is where the government could help turning his subprime dollars into real prime dollars. Could it really be so hard? I mean they are still exactly the same dollars.

A thousand dollars paid monthly during 15 years discounted at 11 percent is worth 88.000 dollars today while the same payments discounted at 6 percent is worth 118.500…35 percent more!

If the government is willing to guarantee, up to a specified amount, the mortgage payments of those who currently own and live in a subprime mortgage financed house then this would empower the borrower to renegotiate with the lender some much better terms, for each of them. This is a win-win strategy for them. Freezing the rates but keeping them subprime is, at best, just a win-lose proposition.

Could this cost the taxpayer some dollars? You bet! But then again someone has to pay for the bank regulators having appointed the credit rating agencies as their financial overseers and with that allowed some small sub-primely awarded mortgage virus to spread globally.