Rep. Frank says hopeful of bailout deal this weekend

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The chairman of the U.S. House of Representatives Financial Services Committee said on Friday he was hopeful Congress could reach a deal on a bank bailout bill this weekend, but he was not giving any firm deadlines.

Asked on the public television program "NewsHour" whether he thought a deal would be reached this weekend, Rep. Barney Frank said: "I hope so, but you know I don't want to say for sure."

"I love the media, but we can't trust you with deadlines," the Massachusetts Democrat said. "If we give you a deadline and there was a power outage and we miss it by a few hours, you overreact. So we're going to try very hard to get a deal but I'm not giving any timelines."

(Reporting by Tim Ahmann)