Law and regulation

Sens. Bob Corker, R-Tenn., and Mark Warner, D-Va., emphasized the bipartisan compromises the two have made in crafting their proposed overhaul of the mortgage finance system.

The Senate's approval of Richard Cordray's nomination to lead the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau is likely to end the Republicans' push for a change to the bureau's structure.

Banks and payment card providers would face caps on the transaction fees they can demand from retailers under European Union plans to rein in charges that have been attacked by regulators as anticompetitive.

Sen. Elizabeth Warren, architect and founder of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, says agency is "the law of the land, and … here to stay."

The Senate's approval of Richard Cordray's nomination to run the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau likely puts an end to another crucial fight over the bureau's structure and its ability to impose far-reaching regulations on the industry.

For the past two weeks, Visa, MasterCard and Discover have been meeting with each other and with regional debit networks to hammer out the business agreements necessary to route debit transactions on EMV-chip cards in the U.S.

A lawsuit against Credit Management Services, a Grand Island, Neb. collection agency, can continue as a class action that might include as many as 27,000 eligible Nebraskans, U.S. District Judge Joseph F. Bataillon has ruled.

The Senate's approval of Richard Cordray's nomination to run the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau does more than give the agency a permanent director: it also removes Republicans' biggest bargaining chip in their longstanding push to force key structural changes at the agency.

Herb Allison, who died Sunday, turned out to have far more in common with his critics than seemed possible during the heat of the financial crisis.

An encompassing denominator and full disclosure requirements should assuage concerns that Basel fails to go far enough to cushion banks for unexpected losses.

Other reforms are getting short shrift while federal regulators fascinate over the power of capital rules to reform the banking business.

Notwithstanding recent media criticism, there is little doubt that these products offer a better alternative for unbanked and underbanked consumers who would otherwise use a cash-based system to manage their finances.

Sen. Mike Crapo, the top Republican on the Senate Banking Committee, asked the Government Accountability Office to shadow the Financial Stability Oversight Council's process for designating systemically important institutions.

On Tuesday the law firm Morrison & Foerster announced that it has hired Donald Lampe, who headed Dykema's financial services regulatory and compliance team, as a partner.

Hedge funds have beaten the FDIC in a series of legal disputes over the assets of bankrupt holding companies, exposing a serious flaw in the regulator's system for recovering value from failed institutions.

The most notable quotes from American Banker stories of the previous week. Readers are encouraged to add their own observations in the Comments fields at the bottom of each slide.

Have you ever imagined starting your own bitcoin exchange? Soon, Vancouver-based Bex.io will make that possible by deploying exchange functionality under a Software as a Service (SaaS) model.

Kipochi, an African online service launched this month, is looking for a way to connect the digital currency Bitcoin to M-Pesa, Kenya's widely-used mobile payments system.

There is little proof that a doubling of guarantee fees in the last year by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac has brought private investors back into the mortgage market, says the FHFA's inspector general in a new report.

Sen. Mike Crapo, the top Republican on the Senate Banking Committee, is asking the Government Accountability Office to examine the Financial Stability Oversight Council's process for designating systemically important institutions to ensure that it is transparent and fair.