(Adds details on loan to YRC, government equity stake)

By David Lawder

WASHINGTON, Dec 10 (Reuters) - U.S. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin said on Thursday he would recommend that his successor next year consider selling the $700 million emergency government loan made to trucking company YRC Worldwide at a profit for taxpayers.

Mnuchin, speaking to a congressional oversight commission on federal coronavirus aid programs, said the loan to YRC, which hauls goods for the Defense Department, "was a risky loan."

"We've been fortunate that the economy recovered, and that the equity is doing well and I am going to recommend that next year, whoever is Treasury secretary seriously look at selling this loan and recovering what I think will be a profit to taxpayers because this was a success," Mnuchin said.

The $700 million loan to YRC, which reported a net loss of $104 million in 2019, came with a 30% equity stake in the trucking firm.

It was the largest and most controversial of 11 loans made from a $17 billion coronavirus rescue fund that was initially intended to bail out large defense contractors such as Boeing Co

and General Electric

Mnuchin, who has not publicly acknowledged that he will be succeeded by President-elect Joe Biden's Treasury nominee, Janet Yellen, said that the Treasury made the loan to protect Defense Department operations and to protect thousands of jobs that would be lost if the company failed.

(Reporting by David Lawder; Editing by Diane Craft and Edmund Blair)

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