Policy & Regulation

Washington Mutual Inc. Wednesday persuaded a bankruptcy judge to consider wiping the slate clean of allegations that major hedge funds engaged in insider trading during the $7 billion bankruptcy.

The central bank has held the federal funds rate near zero for over three years and intends to keep it there. Negative consequences are inevitable and policymakers' ability to manage them far from certain.

The Treasury Department said Wednesday it has completed the sale of pools of securities backed by small business loans, marking the end of another piece of the Troubled Asset Relief Program.

Speech includes plan to remove "red tape" for borrowers, and efforts to investigate those responsible for financial crisis.

GOP legislators raise issues surrounding recess appointment but hearing remains cordial.

Data published this month provides support for criticism of the small business lending program as a backdoor exit from Tarp for small banks. Institutions that used SBLF capital to refinance bailout infusions increased such loans at far lower rates than peers.

Corker blasts the effects of the trading ban on the private market, noting that the government exempted its own bonds.

Alex Pollock's "Let's Put Checks and Balances on CFPB" is spot on describing the enormous danger of a politically unchecked CFPB lording over consumer financial services, and what animates its champions. They believe the financial services industry is rapacious and untrustworthy, a great many of their countrymen are not fully competent to make their own ("the right") choices selecting consumer financial products, and unconstrained regulatory mandarins produce better outcomes than lightly regulated markets.

Walsh sees need for swaps rules, but warns against overlooking the benefits of derivatives to the industry.

The former Tarp special inspector general says the Obama administration has let fears of a political backlash waylay programs that designed to aid the mortgage market and homeowners.