Agency Sees Way to Cut Bailout Costs : S&Ls;: Regulators say they can save $4 billion if they can come up with $22 billion now to pay off notes early.

Federal thrift regulators said Tuesday that the price tag for controversial 1988 savings and loan deals could be trimmed by $3 billion to $4 billion if the government can come up with $22 billion in cash to pay off notes and exercise other options.

Resolution Trust Corp., the agency responsible for disposing of insolvent thrifts, said the 1988 deals will cost taxpayers more than $69 billion without the revisions. The estimate was well above the original figure of $39 billion.

Congress has criticized the deals, contending that the Reagan Administration was too hasty and overly generous in the agreements it struck with investors to acquire insolvent institutions.

Rep. Henry B. Gonzalez (D-Tex.), chairman of the House Banking, Finance and Urban Affairs Committee and a harsh critic of the transactions, said the savings estimate was “dreary” and vowed to demand that all of the deals be examined from top to bottom.

The long-awaited report offered several ways to trim costs within the existing contracts but all would require additional money up front. The RTC is strapped for cash and its chairman, L. William Seidman, has said the pace of closing existing thrifts may have to be slowed as a result of the lack of funds.

Seidman said Congress and the Treasury would have to come up with $22 billion to save up to $4 billion. Seidman said the RTC board would make a recommendation on a strategy to the White House after reviewing the reports.

When the 1988 deals were negotiated, the fund for insuring thrifts was bankrupt. So instead of paying cash assistance to investors acquiring insolvent institutions, the now-defunct Federal Savings and Loan Insurance Corp. issued promissory notes with a high rate of interest payable to the institutions. The agency also guaranteed profits on bad loans and other troubled assets.

The basic plan outlined in the report involves raising enough money now to pay off these long-term obligations and buy back some of the bad loans. This would save the government interest expenses and reduce the assets on which the government has guaranteed a profit.

The proposal is similar to paying off a car loan ahead of schedule. If you pay according to terms of the note, it will cost more than if you come up with the money to pay off the loan early and thus cut interest payments. The higher the interest rate, the more money saved.

By exercising its right to prepay the promissory notes or pay them off, the government would save $1.1 billion to $1.2 billion. Another $520 million would be saved by prepaying a government-guaranteed promissory note issued by Stockton-based American Savings Bank to its subsidiary, New West Savings & Loan. A savings of $535 million could be realized by coming up with $3.8 billion to write down assets covered by federal guarantees to reflect their real market value, rather than the amounts at which many are carried on thrift books now.

Further savings of $1 billion to $2 billion could be realized by a series of steps, including buying some troubled assets from thrifts, restructuring agreements to provide incentives to sell off bad loans and reversing the tax treatment with respect to the deductibility of some losses.

The report cautioned, however, that paying off the promissory notes early could weaken some institutions.