Regulation

The congressional resolution to overturn the payday regulation comes as acting CFPB Director Mick Mulvaney has already said the agency will reconsider the rule internally.

Luckily for Amazon, the OCC is no longer “the angry dad on the porch with a shotgun," trying to keep tech companies from hooking up with banks. JPMorgan Chase’s Amber Baldet can pack a room for a lesson on blockchains. And it is the end of catcalls in France.

The regulatory relief bill frees some regional banks from the tough supervision reserved for larger companies, but regulators still can subject them to onerous requirements.

More than a decade ago, bankers fought Walmart tooth and nail as it made forays into banking. But with Amazon making more moves into financial services, the reaction is very different.

The new law, which is modeled on a similar effort in the United Kingdom, aims to lure financial firms to the desert. It has drawn support from business organizations but opposition from consumer groups — a dynamic that is likely to be replayed in other states.

The information collection effort is consistent with acting CFPB Director Mick Mulvaney's efforts to set the agency on a more pro-industry, anti-enforcement course.

Behavioral biometrics are attractive because they are easy to implement, hard for criminals to spoof and not subject to the same privacy protections applied to thumbprints or retina scans.

While regulatory relief legislation would raise the asset threshold for “systemically important” banks, Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell said the central bank could still apply prudential scrutiny to banks below that new cutoff.

The American Bankers Association has named Naomi Camper, who spent seven years as the top lobbyist for JPMorgan Chase, as its chief policy officer.

Just as promised, Republican lawmakers went to work Wednesday considering regulatory reform ideas that would go further than the Senate's tweaks of the Dodd-Frank Act.