Critics of this process contend it has made the current financial crisis worse by forcing banks to slash the value of assets that are currently depressed because of market conditions.
Treasury officials said the administration's plan was not yet complete and would be revealed in Geithner's speech in Washington next week.
The idea of modifying the current rules on marking down bank assets is being considered by some key lawmakers as a possible way to address the banking crisis.
House Financial Services Committee chairman Barney Frank, a Massachusetts Democrat, said he was in favor of exploring a modification to the mark-to-market requirements that would give banking regulators more discretion so banks would not face the need to cut lending as a consequence of following those standards.
Senate Banking Committee chairman Christopher Dodd, a Connecticut Democrat, said yesterday in an interview he wanted to consider the possibility of modifying the mark-to-market requirements during times when "you get into a procyclical environment and things are spiraling down. That's what we are talking about."
Meanwhile, real estate lobbyists were pressing the government to spend billions to temporarily subsidize lower mortgage rates.
They were looking to Geithner's announcement Monday in hopes that some of the financial rescue money would be used to reduce mortgage rates and prevent foreclosures.
The Federal Reserve has been buying up mortgage-backed securities guaranteed by Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, and Ginnie Mae for a month.
Before rising a bit in recent weeks, mortgage rates had plunged since the Fed disclosed the creation of the $500 billion program late last year.
Geithner met yesterday with Fed chairman Ben Bernanke and other officials who serve on the President's Working Group on Financial Markets.
The group was formed in the wake of the 1987 stock market crash with the goal of better coordinating the government's response to market crises.
The administration's overhaul of the controversial $700 billion bailout plan is expected to provide support to banks to deal with some of the toxic assets that are now weighing down their balance sheets and keeping them from resuming more normal lending.
Geithner said the overhaul of the rescue program was aimed at improving the effort to get credit flowing again and to support President Obama's stimulus plan being debated in Congress.
The working group also will devote time to discussing the reforms needed to ensure that the current financial crisis, the worst to hit the country in seven decades, is not repeated, he said.
