Policy & Regulation

Coastal Bank in Savannah, Ga., has been freed from a regulatory order.

Visa and MasterCard have agreed to share their common application identifier technology, enabling EMV-chip based debit transactions to originate from a single application while allowing merchants a choice of networks for routing.

A new self-regulatory organization for crypto-currencies could do a lot to advance the industry, but risks becoming co-opted by the government and undermining the core value proposition of digital cash.

Leaders in emerging payments and virtual currency have formed a committee to establish a self-regulating body to ensure regulatory compliance as the marketplace changes.

Regulatory reform is likely to continue on its current path if Janet Yellen, the Federal Reserve Board's vice chairman, is tapped to lead the central bank. The future is decidedly murkier if Larry Summers wins the post.

The race to succeed Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke was kicked into high gear last week by rumors President Obama was about to announce his choice. The White House eventually backed off of that, saying a nomination was likely to come in the fall. Still, the speculation over who will be the next central bank chief has reached fever pitch. Following are the top candidates:

American International Group Inc. (AIG) will return funds to customers at its banking unit and shut their accounts amid a retreat from deposit-taking as the Dodd-Frank Act places limits on insurers.

The federal complaint against Castle & Cooke Mortgage issued by the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau looks to be the first of many enforcement actions taken against mortgage originators for failing to follow new loan officer compensation rules.

Bitcoin, a decentralized virtual currency, has been declared illegal in Thailand. Members of the Foreign Exchange Administration and Policy Department made the determination at a meeting on July 29 in the Southeastern Asian country, according to a Bitcoin exchange operator in attendance.

MainSource Financial Group (MSFG) in Greensburg, Ind., has been cleared to redeem the last of the preferred stock it had issued through the Troubled Asset Relief Program.