Law and regulation

Top bankers went out of their way to praise the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau and its Director, Richard Cordray, at American Banker's Retail Financial Services Conference. Despite the happy talk, they stopped short of calling for the GOP to end its opposition to the bureau or for Cordray's directorship to be made permanent.

Promontory's connections and expertise turned the consultant into a private sector regulatory proxy. But those same strengths put the firm in the crosshairs after its role in the failed foreclosure review process and controversial work for MF Global and Standard Chartered.

The Fed's rejection of BB&T's capital plan likely bars the serial acquirer from big acquisitions for several months, but it might be able to pull off a small one.

The results of new stress tests on the nation's largest banks set the financial world abuzz Thursday. But lost in the shuffle were announcements from several smaller institutions, which underwent their own round of stress testing.

Digital money like Bitcoin opens up possibilities for banking without central planners or a lender of last resort, where interest rates and reserve requirements are driven purely by the market.

If Chuck Schumer and Sherrod Brown ever met on the playground, we doubt they would engage in just garden-variety trash-talking.

The U.S. may not follow other countries' lead in forcing EMV chip-card users to use a PIN, but data from a biannual Federal Reserve Board survey indicates there is value to sticking with PIN.

Many Bitcoin enthusiasts expect the U.S. government will take steps towards regulating the digital currency. Whether this regulation will threaten or legitimize the currency is still an open question.

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau announced plans to expand its supervision of the student lending market, proposing that nonbank student loans services become subject to examinations by the bureau. The proposal is another step by the CFPB to broaden its oversight of nonbank financial players.

Regulators and governments worldwide have started a grand experiment to organize a bar code-like identifier for financial market participants. But once-innovative financial utilities may prevent this endeavor from succeeding.

The TV show Parks and Recreation used the made-up bailout of a fictional video rental store to satirize the government's response to the 2008 financial crisis.

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau is preparing to crack down on interest rate markups that automobile dealers add onto the cost of car loans, potentially threatening one of the few bright spots for bank lending of late.

Regulators are not in the bank on a day-to-day basis; usually they can only judge actions after the fact and without all of the relevant information and considerations.

Wells Fargo CEO John Stumpf said banks are no longer "too big to fail," and admonished fellow bankers to accept the existence of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau.

Weve, a joint venture between the UK's three largest telcos, has chosen The Logic Group to provide technology to test a loyalty and coupon program.

The Independent Community Bankers of America has elected its executive committee for the next year.

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau proposed adding nonbank student loan servicers, which account for over 70% of the student loan market, to its supervision program.

The Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations' probe into the JPMorgan Chase "London Whale" trading debacle provides a harsh critique of bank misbehavior, but also raises critical questions about the regulators trained to police it.

While many bankers cite new regulations or the sluggish economy as their primary challenges, PNC's CEO-in-waiting said that an even bigger hurdle could be figuring out how to charge customers for products and services that banks currently give away for free.

In its second round of stress tests in two weeks, the Fed rejected two banks' capital plans — Ally and BB&T — while it found weaknesses in two others, JPMorgan Chase and Goldman Sachs.