Shares in Fremont General Mortgage Corp. surged Tuesday after rumors on Wall Street that the company’s off-again, on-again deal for a cash infusion from a Texas billionaire was apparently on again.

Shares were on the upswing Tuesday, gaining as much as 10 percent, after word surfaced that billionaire banker Gerald Ford and the lender were apparently close to revising the $80-million rescue plan Ford backed out of just last week.

The Santa Monica-based company saw its shares plummet as much as 20 percent last week after Ford told the company he was “not prepared to consummate” the agreement the two had reached earlier in the year. Fremont has refused to comment on the talks.

The initial agreement between Fremont and the Texas-based banker, also the former chief executive of Golden State Bancorp, came after Fremont exited the residential lending business in March amid the collapse of the subprime mortgage market.

The agreement apparently directs Fremont to focus solely on its retail banking business, capitalizing on its 22 retail bank branches in the state. It also has been rumored that Ford will take control of the company.

Shares in Fremont were up 8.8 percent, or 33 cents, to $4.08 in early trading Tuesday on the New York Stock Exchange.