Sallie Mae subpoenaed over lending product

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - The New York Attorney General has subpoenaed Sallie Mae seeking information about a direct-to-consumer lending product, the student loan company said on Friday.

Sallie Mae, legally known as SLM Corp, (SLM.N) said it intended to cooperate with the Attorney General Andrew Cuomo's office regarding the inquiry into the "Tuition Answer" product.

Separately, Sallie also said it closed $31.3 billion in asset-backed commercial paper and term loan facilities that will provide funding to meet the needs of its student loan customers.

Sallie Mae said it expects the new facilities to increase to as much as $34 billion. Sallie expects the funding -- under commitments from several financial institutions including Bank of America (BAC.N) and JPMorgan Chase (JPM.N) -- to begin in the first week of March.

The terms and conditions of the new facilities are consistent with its assumptions for 2008 diluted earnings per share guidance, Sallie Mae said in a statement.

(Reporting by Anupreeta Das in San Francisco and Dan Wilchins in New York, Editing by Leslie Gevirtz and Tim Dobbyn)