President Trump seemed to confirm Wall Street Journal reporting about his plans to take Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac public when he posted an AI-generated image on Truth Social Saturday showing himself at the New York Stock Exchange. The image featured the words "MAGA LISTED NYSE" and "The Great American Mortgage Corporation," with a November 2025 date that suggests he's thinking about combining both government-sponsored enterprises into a single publicly traded entity. While the post was light on details and the White House hasn't officially commented, it appears to validate Friday's WSJ report that the administration believes an IPO could raise roughly $30 billion and values the combined companies at $500 billion or more.
The timeline Trump's image suggests—completing this massive undertaking by the end of the year—has industry analysts raising eyebrows about feasibility. Bose George from Keefe, Bruyette & Woods told reporters that "getting it all done before the end of the year seems very difficult" because regulators still need to figure out capital requirements and structural details that typically take much longer than four months to resolve. Wells Fargo analysts Mario Ichaso and Jonathan Carroll were even more cautious in their Friday report, putting the odds of any release at just 40% given what they called "fundamental challenges" and "elevated execution risk."
The mortgage industry's biggest concern centers on whether any privatized version of these companies would maintain some form of government guarantee, which currently provides stability to the mortgage market and helps keep rates affordable for consumers. Trump addressed this directly in a May social media post, writing that while he's "working on taking these amazing companies public," the U.S. government would "keep its implicit guarantees" and he would "stay strong" in overseeing them as president, according to HousingWire's coverage of his earlier statements.
HousingWire Lead Analyst Logan Mohtashami, who has been tracking Trump's GSE plans extensively, pointed out Saturday that the administration's repeated focus on lowering mortgage rates would likely guide any IPO decisions. "The most important thing about an IPO of Fannie and Freddie is that the administration provides some type of government support to the companies so pricing doesn't get hit," Mohtashami explained, noting that Trump has consistently said he won't pursue privatization if it would cause mortgage rates to rise for consumers.
But Mohtashami also remains skeptical about reading too much into Trump's social media strategy, suggesting these posts often serve as "test balloons to see how the public or the market responds" rather than firm policy announcements. While he expects that "a clear plan for release is in development" behind the scenes, he advises waiting for more concrete information before drawing conclusions about timing or structure. The disconnect between Trump's ambitious timeline and industry analysts' skepticism suggests that whatever plan emerges will likely be more complex and take longer than a single Truth Social image might suggest.
Sources: Wall Street Journal IPO reporting, Truth Social posts, HousingWire analyst coverage, Keefe Bruyette & Woods analysis, Wells Fargo research reports