Retail & Commercial

Lenders are questioning the legal justification for the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau's putting a 36% annual percentage rate threshold in its payday proposal, claiming loans made at that rate are unprofitable. That figure has been the subject of intense debate in the past decade.

PNC Financial Services Group has been named the official bank of the University of Kentucky, its 50th such partnership with a college or university.

A longtime California bank regulator and executive has joined the board at Hanmi Financial in Los Angeles.

Throw Cathy Bessant of Bank of America a question about a hot tech topic, and she's got answers. Blockchain? She loves it but is still waiting for its use case. Patents? The law is making us be aggressive. Swift? A call to action. And that's just the start.

The financial crisis, and its aftermath, created a new layer of regulation to consider. A growing need to fund technology projects and an uncertain rate environment have only made it harder to forecast revenue and expenses.

Debt collectors are facing increasing pressure from the CFPB through aggressive regulation by enforcement. In the past few years, the CFPB has entered into consent orders with debt buyers, banks and other lenders. The orders limit debt sales, increase data requirements and forbid various collection practices.

Aneel Delawalla, managing director at Accenture, offers advice on how bank CFOs can carve out more time for strategic planning, as demands from regulators and investors increase.

Fintech firms and banks should collaborate on using alternative data sources to qualify more borrowers for small-dollar loans.

The FTC's annual report on enforcement actions involving the Electronic Fund Transfer Act, the Truth in Lending Act and the Consumer Leasing Act highlights seven new or ongoing cases involving EFTA issues in 2015.

Illinois owes $3 million to the FBI for processing fingerprints and conducting background checks for professional licenses and permits. The debt is old enough that it could be turned over to the federal government's collection agency - the Treasury Department.