BankThink

What really keeps bankers up at night

No surprise, one of the bankers interviewed in Tuesday's article questioning a key argument against the creation of a consumer protection agency ["Do Safety, Soundness and Consumer Protection Really Conflict?" March 30] disagrees with article's conclusion.

"I have not talked with a fellow community banker who doesn’t think they will be profoundly affected by the rule making authority of the CFPB," Jeffrey Szyperski, chief executive officer of Chesapeake Bank in Kilmarnock, Va., wrote in a comment submitted via American Banker's website.

But Kilmarnock said community bankers have an even bigger beef with other regulatory changes lawmakers are debating. "The big elephant in the room is the stripping of regulation for banks with less than $50 billion in assets from the Fed, combined with the New York Fed President being a presidential appointee," he wrote. "The combination of those two will effectively carve community banks out of input to monetary policy via the FOMC." 

He continued, "The long-term effects of that are immense.  Yes, the CFPB will have an adverse effect on community banks, but these other two provisions, I feel, are even bigger."

The article questioning banks' arguments against a consumer protection agency does have some fans, however. Columbia Journalism Review praised it, along with other publications, for being critical of the industry's spin.

 

 

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