BankThink

The Dodd-Frank stress testing requirements for midsize banks add to their already considerable compliance burden, with questionable payback in terms of better risk management, at least in the near term.

Given the importance and huge upside of success, the risk of disappointment in a firm's diversity and inclusion efforts must be continuously confronted and overcome.

Receiving Wide Coverage ...New York State Regulatory Update: New York attorney general Eric Schneiderman is pushing forward with plans to sue Wells Fargo for allegedly violating the national mortgage settlement, reports the Times' Jessica Silver-Greenberg. American Banker readers will recall Schneiderman warned Wells and Bank of America of a potential lawsuit over alleged servicing settlement violations back in May. "While Wells Fargo is bracing for a lawsuit, Bank of America is poised to announce a series of additional protections that it has adopted after discussions with Mr. Schneiderman's office," Silver-Greenberg writes. The lawsuit against Wells is expected to be filed as early as today. Meanwhile, New York regulator Benjamin Lawsky scored a big win in his crackdown on the payday lending industry yesterday when a federal judge ruled he did have authority to regulate online lenders with Native American ties. "The ruling could encourage other states with interest rate caps to take legal action to ban tribal lenders that charge triple-digit rates in their jurisdictions," the Washington Post notes.

Although American Banker's Editor-at-Large Barbara Rehm believes the implementation of Dodd-Frank is taking too long, enough people have told her otherwise, so she presents our readers with the counter-argument.

Under the 2010 Dodd-Frank Act, regulators have the authority to apply tighter regulations on firms that pose a significant threat to the financial system-and they are doing just that with asset management firms.

In a little-noticed agreement with Wells Fargo, the Office of Foreign Assets Control raised the bar on acceptable checking practices and potentially exposed many other financial institutions to penalties.

Editor-at-Large Barbara A. Rehm has argued for months that Dodd-Frank implementation should be sped up so banks can know the rules they face. A slew of sources disagree – here’s why.

Giving the rest of our sales teams regular snapshots of factors that brought about star performances is far more useful than simply reporting who those star performers are.

Receiving Wide Coverage ...Shutdown: The government shut down after House Republicans and Senate Democrats failed to reach a funding deal before the midnight deadline. Big picture coverage is here: Wall Street Journal, New York Times, Financial Times, Washington Post

Because third-party processors are on the hook for losses from fraudulent transactions, they have as much interest in eliminating bad actors as anyone.