Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac released their year-end mortgage activity summaries last week and the numbers were not particularly good. In terms of sheer mortgage business volume, both government-sponsored enterprises did considerably worse in 2004 than the residential mortgage market as a whole. While new originations fell 25.3 percent in 2004, Fannie’s total mortgage business plunged a hefty 49.0 percent and Freddie’s tumbled 40.1 percent from year-earlier levels (see table on next page). …