Law and regulation

The Dodd-Frank Act called on regulators to develop ways to assess diversity practices in the financial sector, but the guidelines are getting panned by critics who say they do not go far enough.

A House Financial Services subcommittee will hold a hearing Thursday on employee allegations of discrimination and retaliation at the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau.

The regulatory path may also be bumpier for P-to-P lenders that focus on subprime borrowers, predicts Raj Date, a former second-in-command at the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau.

The Canadian Senate Banking, Trade and Commerce committee has issued a report encouraging "a light regulatory touch — almost a hands-off approach" to regulating digital currencies.

Determining regulatory requirements based on banks’ activities rather than their size would liberate old-school institutions from unnecessary burdens without endangering the financial system.

While regulators worldwide have urged banks not to "derisk" by cutting off entire industries or geographies, it is rare for policymakers to specifically cite this controversial sector as wrongly underserved.

A recap of the informed opinions (and the discussions they generated) on BankThink this week, including the need to hold bankers accountable for criminal deeds and whether the FDIC's proposed recordkeeping requirement is smart planning or pointless.

BB&T's auto-finance division will stop dealers from marking up the price on sales contracts, and instead will offer a flat-fee compensation program.

Many lenders may not have been ready for the CFPB's new mortgage disclosure rule if it took effect on Aug. 1 as planned. Now a slip-up by the agency itself has given lenders a two-month reprieve.

The Consumer Services division of Washington state's Department of Financial Institutions has accused Quicken Loans of sending false claims in direct mail advertising to military members.

Pressure from community groups forced Valley National Bancorp to strengthen its commitment to lend in low-and moderate-income neighborhoods in order to win approval for a Florida acquisition. Other banks, too, are now placing CRA efforts front-and-center as they aim to sell deals to the public and their regulators.

The Treasury Department gave financial institutions a rare pat on the back in a recent analysis of anti-money-laundering safeguards, saying the system has significantly improved.

Incorporating bill and rental payment data into consumer credit scores would be a boon for underserved Americans. New legislation in Congress could help credit reporting agencies realize this goal.

American Banker readers share their views on the most pressing banking topics of the week. Comments are excerpted from reader response sections of AmericanBanker.com articles and from our social media platforms.

FHA tries to clarify what loan defects will bring the harshest penalties to guide lenders and instill more confidence.

The Federal Reserve Board Thursday finalized changes to rules governing the calculation of interest payments on excess cash reserves held at regional Fed banks, a technical change aimed at easing the inevitable rise in federal interest rates in the future.

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau has fined a medical debt collector and ordered the company to provide financial relief to consumers for mishandling credit-reporting disputes.

The insurance provider said that it is not eligible for designation as a Systemically Important Financial Institution because it is not primarily a financial company, and even if it were, FSOC wrongly used the firm's size alone to subject it to heightened regulation.

A technical error made by the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau has become a saving grace for lenders who had pushed, begged and pleaded for more time to comply with a new mortgage disclosure rule.

It turns out the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau's failure to file a two-page form to Congress on time was the unspecified "administrative error" that delayed the effective date for new mortgage disclosure rules.