Greg Baer

Once a helpful tool for law enforcement, CTRs have become next to useless in the fight against money laundering. It's time to retire them in favor of more modern and effective measures.

Banks solved the issue of consumer data sharing years ago. Why is the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau stepping in now, with a rule that could make sharing data less safe and secure?

Regulators are pushing a scheme that is completely out of touch with international regulatory norms. It would irreparably harm both consumers and the U.S. economy.

The only way for Fincen to assure that banks have the tools to identify illicit shell companies is for the agency to verify the information in its new beneficial ownership database.

The country's largest banks should deepen partnerships with minority depository institutions and community development financial institutions, and regulators should facilitate that process.

Leaders of the Bank Policy Institute and The Clearing House say their conferences are neither profit centers nor potential conflicts of interest for regulators in response to a recent BankThink piece that describes the meeting as an example of overly cozy relationships between banks and regulators.

Constraining consolidation will only hurt the goal of expanding consumers' access to banking services and credit.

Some policymakers have been calling for a temporary halt to large bank deals while the criteria for approvals are reevaluated. Yet Congress was clear about its intention to stop regulators from holding up bank mergers, argues the head of a trade group for large financial services companies.

If Biden appointees are going to apply more antitrust scrutiny to bank mergers, they need to factor into their analysis the competitive threat that banks face from fintechs and other less-regulated players.

Critics of consolidation say the Federal Reserve and other agencies are too quick to greenlight bank deals. But the truth is banks face many hurdles to merger approval, and they don’t bother to apply — or take a hint and withdraw their applications — if they can’t clear them all.