Ebrima Santos Sanneh

The Treasury Department Wednesday proposed a set of rules that would require stablecoin issuers to abide by risk-based anti-money-laundering programs similar to those that banks must employ, as well as secondary market monitoring and independent testing by issuers. 

The FDIC board voted unanimously to issue a proposal putting a rebuttable ban on bank-issuers paying yield on stablecoins, another narrowing AML requirements and a third prohibiting examiners using reputational risk in exams, outside of operational or financial risks.

The partnership between the long-established bank and the fintech brokerage will handle the development of the government-owned account platform behind the new government-seeded retirement accounts for children. 

New jobs in health care largely drove the gains, while the federal workforce and finance continued to shrink.

The proposal allows states substantial flexibility but sets guardrails against regulatory arbitrage.

Banks have a lot to celebrate in the operational risk framework, but advocates warn it cuts capital too far.

The regulator argues the plans were costly, too theoretical and ineffective, eliminating the financial crisis-era requirement as part of the Trump Administration's deregulatory push.

The Treasury's financial crimes enforcement wing proposed a rule Monday that would incentivize whistleblowers to come forth with information that could assist in cracking down on scams, fraud or money laundering, at a time of heightened geopolitical risk.

The Federal Deposit Insurance Corp.'s Office of Inspector General said in a Thursday report that staffing cuts over the past year could strain supervision and the agency's response to a crisis.

VALT, a digital-oriented small-business lender founded by U.S. Bank veteran Matt Gediman, received approval for its denovo charter application from the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency 120 days after its application, clearing a key regulatory hurdle at a time when regulators are encouraging the formation of more startup banks.

The Financial Stability Oversight Council Wednesday published a proposed guidance focused on designating activities rather than individual firms for heightened prudential standards, making it more difficult for the council to designate firms going forward.

Speaking at the Digital Asset Summit, the Comptroller of the Currency argued that part of his goal in shifting the agency's posture toward the crypto industry is to allow smaller financial institutions to engage in novel technologies, which he said will keep banks relevant.

The reported reversal comes after the industry worried verifying citizenship would strain banks and push customers out of the system.

The Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. rolled back a 2009 policy that banned nonbanks from buying failed banks, a move the agency says aims to widen the bidder pool and cut failure costs.

Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. Chair Travis Hill said in remarks Wednesday that privacy and know-your-customer gaps remain for banks that work with public, permissionless blockchains, and that the agency may need to clarify how banks can interact with them. 

Comptroller of the Currency Jonathan Gould encouraged the audience at a crypto conference Tuesday to weigh in on the agency's GENIUS Act implementation rule and said a separate anti-money laundering proposal from OCC and Treasury would be coming soon.

A coalition of Democratic attorneys general, led by California and Illinois, have sued the Department of Housing and Urban Development over a guidance that they argue will scale back enforcement to strict federal standards and threaten state funding to enforce fair housing laws.

Federal bank enforcement actions have dropped sharply since the start of the second Trump administration, but experts' views vary about whether less enforcement will result in a buildup of risk in the financial system.

Comptroller of the Currency Jonathan Gould said one of the early messages he is hearing from banks and supervisors revolves around an uneven playing field between small banks and their core providers, but suggested formal rules to address the problem are not imminent.

Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. Chair Travis Hill said in a speech Wednesday morning that the agency will move to codify stablecoins as ineligible for deposit insurance — which is required under the GENIUS Act — and that the prohibition likely will include pass-through deposit insurance arrangements.