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The central bank should consider using a tool requiring higher capital amounts when times are good rather than offering temporary regulatory relief in a downturn, said Boston Fed President Eric Rosengren.

The Financial Stability Oversight Council has struggled to find its footing since its creation in Dodd-Frank. The Treasury secretary has signaled a more aggressive role for the panel, including reviving its authority to target nonbank behemoths.

Senate Banking Committee Chairman Sherrod Brown asked banks involved with Bill Hwang’s Archegos Capital Management to explain their role in the firm’s implosion.

In his annual message to investors, the JPMorgan Chase CEO said Big Tech and fintechs are "here to stay" and vowed to be aggressive in taking on these new challengers. He also predicted that the economy would take off this year, but said capital rules prevented banks from doing more to help blunt the impact of the pandemic recession.

In his annual letter shareholders, JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon said banks are facing "enormous competitive threats — from virtually every angle."

Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen conducted her first meeting as chair of the Financial Stability Oversight Council and set the stage for a potential recalibration of the panel's role after it was weakened in the Trump administration.

The heads of the Federal Reserve and Treasury are urging passage of legislation that would replace Libor with the Secured Overnight Financing Rate in certain contracts. That would spare banks litigation over trillions of dollars of contracts when Libor expires in 2023.

For banks that pass this year’s stress tests, the Federal Reserve said it will eliminate the restrictions on dividends and share buybacks while subjecting those institutions instead to the stress capital buffer.

Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen said she prefers to have the Financial Stability Oversight Council flag hazardous activities by nonbanks rather than subject specific firms to heightened supervision.

Top officials at the U.S. central bank and Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen reaffirmed their commitment to understand how extreme weather events affect financial institutions and the economy as a whole. Many Republicans, however, worry the Federal Reserve’s new climate focus strays too far from its traditional function.

Legacy contracts using the London interbank offered rate — which is set to be phased out at the end of this year — were granted a reprieve to mid-2023. However, there is no wiggle room on when the rate will expire for new deals, said Federal Reserve Vice Chairman Randal Quarles.

Jelena McWilliams, a Trump appointee, pushed back Wednesday on reports that an incoming Democratic majority may be able to enact policy at the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. without her support. "The chairman really controls the board agenda," she said.

The Federal Reserve will determine within days whether to extend the easing of the supplementary leverage ratio for big banks past March 31, Chairman Jerome Powell says. And it's a couple of weeks away from announcing whether there will be limits on second-quarter dividends and buybacks, he says.

The Ohio Democrat and chairman of the Senate Banking Committee told a virtual gathering of the American Bankers Association that FedAccounts, a plan opposed by industry trade groups, will lead to more bank customers.

"On streets, online and in many Asian-owned small businesses, we are seeing physical assault, verbal harassment and refusal of service," JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon wrote in a memo to staff. "These racist acts cannot — and will not — be tolerated."

Federal Savings Bank, the Chicago bank that lent millions of dollars to Paul Manafort under its founder and former longtime CEO, has now sued the former Trump campaign chairman and his wife, seeking to foreclose upon his mansion in the Hamptons.

With a steady stream of Senate hearings held on the racial wealth gap and inequities in the financial system, the new chairman has set a consumer-focused agenda that leans further left than even past Democratic chairs.

The bill introduced by Rep. Patrick McHenry, the top Republican on the Financial Services Committee, would expand CFPB authority to the credit reporting industry and require that certain adverse information be removed from a consumer’s credit history.

The House Financial Services chair joined other Democrats to warn the federal agencies against further easing of the supplementary leverage ratio, a key capital requirement for large banks.

The comments by Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. Chair Jelena McWilliams published in Politico reinforce optimism that the banking agencies could settle years of disagreement about modernizing the Community Reinvestment Act.