Fed bought $23.025 bln net in agency MBS in latest week

NEW YORK, Sept 24 (Reuters) - The Federal Reserve bought $23.025 billion net of agency mortgage-backed securities in the latest week, the New York Fed said on its website on Thursday.

That was down from the previous week's net purchases of $25.45 billion.

The purchases brought the U.S. central bank's purchase of mortgage bonds guaranteed by Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac and the Federal Home Loan Bank system to roughly $884.9 billion since January.

The Fed said it bought $25.675 billion gross of agency MBS from Sept. 17 through Sept. 23. At the same time, it sold $2.65 billion in mortgage securities.

The New York Federal Reserve said on Wednesday it will reduce its average weekly purchase amounts of agency mortgage-backed securities starting with purchases done in the reporting week beginning Thursday, Sept. 24.

The New York Fed also said it will gradually reduce both the size and frequency of agency debt purchases, and that those purchases will decline to once every two weeks beginning in the first quarter of 2010.

Those purchases will continue to be done, on average, once a week before declining in the first quarter, and all other terms of the purchase programs will remain unchanged, the New York Fed said.

The Fed aims to buy $1.25 trillion of agency MBS in a bid to bring down mortgage rates and to stimulate the battered housing sector and the overall economy.

(For more details on the purchases, please click on: here) (Reporting Julie Haviv, additional reporting by Chris Reese; Editing by Dan Grebler)