Law and regulation

MasterCard is confident that the proposed $7.25 billion settlement of allegations that it and Visa engaged in merchant fee price fixing will receive final approval, according to Nomura analysts who recent met with key executives of the card network.

Ensuring that corporate boards include a diverse set of skills, backgrounds and personalities helps against groupthink's dislocation of corporate and shareholder interests.

The U.K. banking giant has agreed to pay $1.9 billion to settle U.S. money-laundering charges. Unsettled is whether global banks have the controls to avoid a repeat.

HSBC Holdings Plc, Europe's largest bank, agreed to pay $1.92 billion to settle U.S. probes of money laundering in the largest such accord ever.

The Treasury Department is scheduled on Tuesday to auction warrants to purchase 1.2 million shares of common stock in M&T Bank.

Bitcoin-Central, a French digital currency exchange that handles the largely unregulated Bitcoin currency, now operates under French regulation after parent-company Paymium partnered with payment services provider Aqoba.

The jump in Bank of America’s Basel III capital ratio in the third quarter reflected favorable moves in rates and credit spreads, not retained earnings.

The House is scheduled to vote this week on a bill that would exempt banks from sending an annual privacy notice to customers unless the disclosures have changed from a year earlier.

The $1.75 billion-asset company disclosed late last week that its purchase agreements with ValStone Partners, a private-equity firm in Michigan, had been terminated. Calls to Capitol (CBCRQ) and ValStone were not immediately returned.

FDIC and Bank of England released a white paper showing agreement about resolution approaches as a top BOE official signaled flexibility in how the U.S. resolves firms with U.K. operations.

Standard Chartered Bank will pay $327 million to settle charges that it violated U.S. law by laundering millions of dollars for banks and others in Iran and Sudan.

Bob Kottler, an executive at Iberiabank, hopes the Consumer Bankers Association can help shape the agency’s rulemaking process in 2013.

In the first of the FDIC's 39 suits against bank executives, it has won a jury verdict declaring three former IndyMac executives breached their fiduciary duties by lending recklessly to home builders during the housing boom.

The Senate is scheduled to vote Tuesday on a bill that would extend a crisis-era program that guarantees certain business accounts.

HSBC (HBC) is overhauling its unit that oversees compliance with laws designed to deter financial crime, and putting a former Treasury Department official in charge of it.

Typical acquirers — including banks, processors and independent sales organizations — stand to lose up to 5% of their business next month because of problems with Internal Revenue Service 1099K reporting, a tax expert says.

Congressional approval for a two-year extension would, among other things, prevent more uncertainty, minimize deposit concentration and maximize financial stability.

Patrick Pinto, a former vice president at Oxford Collection Agency, was arrested on a federal criminal complaint charging him with conspiracy to commit bank bribery during his time with the company.

Housing advocates say a gap has opened between the relief the five big mortgage servicers agreed to provide under a $25 billion settlement and what borrowers are seeing on the ground.

As policymakers negotiate to avoid the fiscal cliff, bank lobbyists are fighting to extend TAG, the Obama administration is facing a nearly defunct FHA, and Chicago will become the first city in the country to directly report information to the CFPB.