Compliance

Mick Mulvaney’s unapologetic memo to staff about the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau’s mission headlined a spate of developments this past week as he continues to transform the agency. Here are the key developments.

The candidates being discussed lately to run the agency bring experience on consumer protection issues, and potential bipartisan appeal.

Most general counsels are men, but in 2017 women filled more than half of the top legal positions that opened up at large financial firms. The trend is likely to continue as the population of women lawyers swells and banks continue to diversify their senior ranks.

There are a host of new growth opportunities for credit unions in the year ahead, but CUs must be proactive if they hope to mkae the most of them.

Now that bitcoin's market spike has made the alternative currency a household name, it's linked to wild market swings, bubble-level valuations and onerous fees, with the most obvious fixes likely furthering bitcoin's problems rather than solving them.

Bank of America Merrill Lynch has launched an application programming interface (API) gateway available to third-party fintech providers, as part of preparations for Europe’s PSD2 regulations that went into effect this month.

Developers of mobile point of sale solutions now have a path to build secure applications to support PIN entry on tablets and smartphones, following the Payment Card Industry Security Standards Council’s latest update.

A fintech investment surge is underway across Europe. What’s unknown is how the looming Brexit situation may affect the U.K.’s strong fintech momentum, and where exactly funds would flow if talent and startups flee Britain.

Mastercard plans to deploy its biometric authentication option for European consumers to use through their smartphones when shopping online or conducting mobile banking.

Wells Fargo joins the list of banks recently hobbled by tech outages. Is there a better response than "Sorry for the inconvenience"?

Acting Consumer Financial Protection Bureau Director Mick Mulvaney has cited hundreds of confirmed and suspected data breaches as justification for his halting the bureau's data collection activities last month.

To free the payments industry from seven decades of standards and legacy operations, the Secure Remote Payment Council is asking more stakeholders to embrace the concept of an open operating standard for security and transaction routing.

Comptroller of the Currency Joseph Otting blasted a letter from Senate Democrats criticizing his agency for not implementing recommendations on supervision in the wake of the Wells Fargo scandal.

If anyone has doubted that acting Consumer Financial Protection Bureau Director Mick Mulvaney intends to overhaul the agency, the last three days alone have put those doubts to rest.

The Office of the Comptroller of the Currency’s semiannual report on industry risk said tougher competition between banks, leading to looser underwriting, could arise from the economic expansion.

HSBC has agreed to pay $100 million in penalties to resolve a Justice Department investigation into the rigging of currency rates, according to a person familiar with the matter.

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau faces significant obstacles in reopening the payday lending rule including likely legal challenges and a lengthy compliance process with the Administrative Procedure Act.

Acting CFPB director Mick Mulvaney issued "a call for evidence" Wednesday seeking comment on all of the consumer agency's functions, including enforcement, supervision, rulemaking, market monitoring and education activities.

As more small businesses hire workers for short-term gigs, Intuit is adding features to QuickBooks to streamline the paperwork around paying these contract employees.

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau said Tuesday it will reopen the payday lending rule, on the same day the controversial rule technically went into effect.