Exhibit 99

                                 FARMER MAC NEWS

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE                                       CONTACT
May 12, 2005                                                Jerome Oslick
                                                            202-872-7700

                     Farmer Mac's Regulator Approves Revised
                   Final Rule on Regulatory Capital Standards

     Washington,  D.C. -- The Federal Agricultural  Mortgage Corporation (Farmer
Mac, NYSE: AGM and AGM.A) reported that its federal  regulator,  the Farm Credit
Administration  ("FCA"), at an open meeting today of its Board, approved a final
rule that relates to regulatory capital standards on certain assets held by Farm
Credit System (FCS)  institutions  other than Farmer Mac. Among other revisions,
the Board removed from the final rule a provision in the August 6, 2004 proposed
regulation that would have required FCS  institutions  to risk-weight  assets on
their books that are  guaranteed  by a  government  sponsored-enterprise  (GSE),
including Farmer Mac, based on the issuer credit rating of the GSE as determined
by a nationally recognized statistical rating organization.

     Farmer Mac is a  stockholder-owned  instrumentality  of the  United  States
chartered  by Congress to  establish a secondary  market for  agricultural  real
estate and rural housing mortgage loans and to facilitate capital market funding
for USDA-guaranteed farm program and rural development loans. Farmer Mac's Class
C non-voting  and Class A voting  common stocks are listed on the New York Stock
Exchange under the symbols AGM and AGM.A,  respectively.  Additional information
about Farmer Mac is available on Farmer Mac's website at www.farmermac.com.

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