A lawyer for the Office of Thrift Supervision said regulators "are feeling a lot of pressure" to increase enforcement orders against banks.
Deborah Dakin, deputy chief counsel for business transactions in the OTS' regulations and legislation division, said Friday during a housing conference at Pepperdine University's Law School that regulators used to think they could work informally with management and not issue public enforcement orders.
"Congress doesn't want to hear that," Dakin told about 100 lawyers at the conference. "The inspector generals for the agencies, when they go in with 20-20 hindsight, want to count enforcement orders."
"I think regulators in general are feeling a lot of pressure to document everything they're doing and not take a longer-term view" in which problems could be worked out informally, she said, adding that the views she expressed were her own, not those of the agency.
"As long as you have Congress holding hearings, Congress wants to see formal enforcement actions," she said.
