Law and regulation

Mary Mack is beginning damage control as she overhauls Wells' sales culture; Dorothy Savarese talks diversity of bank sizes as she becomes chairman of the ABA; and Elizabeth Warren implores the president to demote Mary Jo White. Also, industry manbassadors talk work-life balance and the importance of flexibility for women as Visa's CEO resigns to devote more time to family. And a couple of small activist firms are taking on gender bias at the world's largest companies.

A federal appeals court's decision that declared the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau an arm of the White House relies on a novel interpretation of the constitution's separation of powers clause that could have broader effects on how other regulators like the OCC and FHFA interact.

In its biennial survey, the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. found that in 2015, 7% of U.S. households were unbanked, marking a 0.7% drop from 2013.

A slew of recent cases of misconduct in banking – from both the investment and retail sides of the business – have eroded the trustworthiness of the entire industry, William Dudley, president of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, said Thursday.

A win by Hillary Clinton would be something of a mixed bag for bankers. On the one hand, she's a moderate with detailed policies, many of which are bank-friendly. Yet she may also be pushed to the left as she navigates issues, particularly on regulatory appointments.

The California Department of Justice is investigating Wells Fargo for allegations of criminal identity theft.

WASHINGTON — Banks are generally seeing improving credit quality and loan demand across the consumer and industrial sectors, according to a report issued Wednesday by the Federal Reserve Board.

Banks are reacting positively to a sweeping new cybersecurity proposal from regulators, noting that it only targets the largest institutions and keys off of existing practices.

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau decried an appeals court ruling last week that found its single-director structure unconstitutional, saying the opinion was "wrongly decided" and had "no basis in the text of the Constitution or in Supreme Court case law."

Rather than addressing a pressing need like an economic crisis, a fintech charter would place the federal government in the business of choosing winners and losers in a market, with the potential to distort the banking system.

Federal banking regulators issued a broad proposal Wednesday designed to counteract cybersecurity threats that could hit at the financial industry's critical junctures.

A strong and dynamic risk detection system requires focusing on the most important blind spots not satisfactorily explained by existing tools, rather than focusing on the "answers" produced by those tools.

A survey of more than 300 bankers reveals deep industry skepticism, whether of Clinton's pledge to pursue regulatory relief or Trump's claim that the Fed was playing politics with interest rates. Coming this week: what a Clinton or Trump victory would mean for banks.

Two San Francisco supervisors on Tuesday introduced a resolution that would "end all business with Wells Fargo," in response to the fake account scandal and other practices that have harmed consumers.

Recent moves by the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, including a plan to regulate payday lending, take away what limited credit options consumers have.

Student loan borrowers face breakdowns and delays in applying for repayment plans that feature loan forgiveness or interest subsidies, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau said in a report released Monday.

Such a charter comes with a bevy of legal and policy questions to resolve, including whether parent companies of firms that obtain a fintech charter would have to subject themselves to oversight by the Federal Reserve Board. State regulators, meanwhile, fear a new charter could erode their ability to regulate firms within their jurisdictions.

The Federal Financial Institutions Examination Council reiterated Monday that its cybersecurity assessment tool is voluntary, despite bankers' fears that not using it could put them in hot water with their examiners.

As a result of the SEC's latest reforms, today's money-market funds are very different products than their precrisis predecessors. Calls for additional layers of burdensome regulation over this industry are unwarranted.

Dorothy Savarese, the head of Cape Cod Five Cents Savings Bank in Massachusetts, seeks a financial system where the rules encourage community banks and big banks to do the things that they are best at.