Ace Cash Express Hit by Rioters; B of A Probed for Trades

Receiving Wide Coverage ...

Riots in Baltimore: Most media outlets have coverage of the rioting in Baltimore, with at least 15 police officers injured and numerous businesses destroyed or looted, including a branch of Ace Cash Express, following Monday's funeral of Freddie Gray. Officials declared a state of emergency. Protesting the police force's alleged excessive force against the city's minority community, rioters burned and looted a CVS pharmacy and other buildings in the Mondawmin neighborhood. Additionally, a community center and housing for seniors in another neighborhood was destroyed by fire, although officials did not know yet if it was connected to the rioting. Gov. Larry Hogan called in 5,000 National Guard troops and another 5,000 officers from other police forces. Baltimore Sun, Wall Street Journal, New York Times, Financial Times

Wall Street Journal

Federal officials are investigating whether Bank of America violated customer-protection rules by putting retail-brokerage funds at risk in order to generate higher profits, unnamed sources told the Journal. The Securities and Exchange Commission is probing whether "the bank used large, complex trades and loans to save tens of millions of dollars a year in funding costs and to free up billions of dollars in cash and securities for trading that Bank of America otherwise would have needed to keep off-limits." The trades took place at B of A's Merrill Lynch unit and were halted in mid-2012. The regulations governing the specific type of trading, known as Rule 15c3-3, are designed to allow banks to have enough cash on hand to repay clients, in the event that the company fails. Following the failures of Lehman Brothers in 2008 and MF Global in 2011, where the firms didn't have sufficient cash to pay brokerage customers, regulators toughened protections. A B of A spokeswoman said the bank fully complied with the rules governing the trades.

Community banks and credit unions have teamed up to fight for a bigger share of the monies Target and Home Depot are doling out as a result of their data breaches. Smaller institutions say they get the short shrift from the longstanding way Visa and MasterCard negotiate settlements with merchants and then distribute the proceeds to financial institutions. Big banks get most of the proceeds, while smaller banks and credit unions don't receive an amount commensurate with their level of losses. Credit unions and community banks jointly filed a motion in federal court asking for permission to seek additional compensation.

New York Times

An FBI agent who was one of the leaders of the criminal investigation of the JPMorgan Chase cyberattack is leaving for a job with a private investigation firm. Austin Berglas' departure for K2 Intelligence is not likely to affect the JPMorgan probe.

Royal Bank of Scotland agreed to sell a portfolio of $5.6 billion of corporate loans in North America to Mizhuo Financial Group. After the sale, RBS will have disposed of about two-thirds of corporate loans it had held in North America.

Elsewhere ...

The New Yorker: "I told my assistant, I'll spend thirty minutes with this loopy woman and then come get me and just make an excuse that I've got a call or something." That comment was made by Cam Fine, chief executive of the Independent Community Bankers of America, and it was about Elizabeth Warren, back before she was a Democratic senator from Massachusetts. The context is Warren was trying to rustle up support for the creation of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. Warren knew Fine and his community bankers wouldn't support the creation of the bureau and there was a good chance they'd try to kill it. So Warren chose the tactic of trying to persuade Fine to be neutral. She successfully did so by showing Fine that the megabanks would try to use community banks as "human shields," as Fine himself has described small banks' relationship to big banks, in order to get their way. In the end, Warren's meeting led Fine to lobby to keep community banks from being regulated directly by the CFPB, the article relates.

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