Law and regulation

A move by Pennsylvania lawmakers to abolish the state's savings-and-loan association charter comes as the number of thrifts nationwide continues to decline and the "S&L" name loses its former appeal.

The Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago entered a written agreement with the $87 million-asset lender on July 23, Fed officials said Tuesday.

The former House Financial Services Committee chairman and Sheila Bair, the former FDIC chairman, both joined Twitter this week, with Barney Frank earning a surprise celebrity endorsement.

Price competition remains elusive in the market for loans to consumers with poor credit histories. Here's why.

Coastal Bank in Savannah, Ga., has been freed from a regulatory order.

Visa and MasterCard have agreed to share their common application identifier technology, enabling EMV-chip based debit transactions to originate from a single application while allowing merchants a choice of networks for routing.

A new self-regulatory organization for crypto-currencies could do a lot to advance the industry, but risks becoming co-opted by the government and undermining the core value proposition of digital cash.

Leaders in emerging payments and virtual currency have formed a committee to establish a self-regulating body to ensure regulatory compliance as the marketplace changes.

Regulatory reform is likely to continue on its current path if Janet Yellen, the Federal Reserve Board's vice chairman, is tapped to lead the central bank. The future is decidedly murkier if Larry Summers wins the post.

The race to succeed Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke was kicked into high gear last week by rumors President Obama was about to announce his choice. The White House eventually backed off of that, saying a nomination was likely to come in the fall. Still, the speculation over who will be the next central bank chief has reached fever pitch. Following are the top candidates:

American International Group Inc. (AIG) will return funds to customers at its banking unit and shut their accounts amid a retreat from deposit-taking as the Dodd-Frank Act places limits on insurers.

The federal complaint against Castle & Cooke Mortgage issued by the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau looks to be the first of many enforcement actions taken against mortgage originators for failing to follow new loan officer compensation rules.

Bitcoin, a decentralized virtual currency, has been declared illegal in Thailand. Members of the Foreign Exchange Administration and Policy Department made the determination at a meeting on July 29 in the Southeastern Asian country, according to a Bitcoin exchange operator in attendance.

MainSource Financial Group (MSFG) in Greensburg, Ind., has been cleared to redeem the last of the preferred stock it had issued through the Troubled Asset Relief Program.

Modern banking exposes our financial system to considerable risks. Government attempts to contain these risks exacerbate them. Here’s a proposed alternative: A “Depositary” that stores money for a fee without lending.

Visa and MasterCard may differ on their support of chip-and-PIN in the U.S., but they are of one mind in their approach to Australia.

Wells Fargo has temporarily stopped selling defaulted consumer debts to collections agencies. Its move follows a more drastic pullback by JPMorgan Chase and a regulatory crackdown on the collections industry.

Inspired by his old boss Ted Kennedy and steeped in the legal issues surrounding bank regulation, Daniel Tarullo, the Federal Reserve's dominant voice on supervision matters, has amassed significant influence both at home and abroad, as he helps to carry out a major reshaping of the rules governing U.S. banks and the global financial system.

The threat of regulators kicking banks out of the commodities business is driving fears that market liquidity and competition will suffer as a result.

A recap of the informed opinions (and the discussions they generated) on BankThink this week.