Some European market participants have been eyeing the U.S. government-sponsored enterprise model's applicability to their own market, but much of Western Europe "doesn't see a strong interest" in creating a Fannie Mae/Freddie Mac equivalent, according to a German mortgage banking executive."The situation in Europe is completely different" from that in the United States, Louis Hagen, general manager of the Association of German Mortgage Bankers (Verband Deutscher Hypothekenbanken), told MortgageWire. Therefore, he says the GSE model may not be entirely applicable, although he acknowledges that it has some strengths in terms of integrating mortgage markets. Mr. Hagen, who was in the United States recently for a conference on Germany's pfandbriefe bonds, said he considers the GSEs competitors in at least one respect. "We see the GSEs and the pfandbriefe competing for the same investment group," he said.
