Legal issues and news

It is long past time to revisit the regulatory regime implementing the Bank Secrecy Act. In a good sign, key elements of the Trump administration seem to be in alignment on reform.

A federal appeals court agreed to have the full bench rehear arguments by the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau's union about whether the Trump administration planned to gut the agency through mass firings.

Nine banks and lenders were impacted by the yearslong, $923 million fraud enterprise, according to an indictment of top Tricolor executives. The banks were not publicly named, but JPMorganChase, Fifth Third, Barclays, Louisiana-based Origin Bancorp and Texas-based Triumph Financial have said they would take write-downs.

The Department of Justice wants Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell to state if the central bank is profitable again and can, therefore, fund the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau.

Passkey technology offers a superior method of authenticating customer identification, both in terms of convenience and security. It's time for banks to finally make the transition.

New data shows a 21% jump in fraud attempts during Thanksgiving week, with automated bots and credential stuffing leading the charge.

HoldCo Asset Management says that shareholders should reject Fifth Third's proposed acquisition of Comerica during a Jan. 6 vote due to what it calls an "unacceptable" negotiation process and the possible upside from another deal.

Part of the growing "phishing-as-a-service" economy, the Spiderman kit offers novice hackers sophisticated tools to target customers of major EU institutions.

Know-your-customer rules are a longtime fixture of bank compliance regimes, but as autonomous AI "agents" increasingly access banking systems, new rules for verifying their status are desperately needed.

Mary Carole McDonnell allegedly posed as a McDonnell-Douglas heiress to secure loans. The FBI believes she is currently hiding in Dubai.

The DOJ says the Ukrainian national helped coordinate Russian state-sponsored DDoS attacks against banks internationally.

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau plans to issue an interim final rule soon on consumer financial data rights because the agency expects to run out of money by Dec. 31.

A federal court cannot modify a preliminary injunction to compel the acting director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau to request funding for the agency, the Department of Justice said.

Democratic senators are calling for Senate Banking Committee Chairman Tim Scott to compel the acting director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau to testify.

In oral arguments held Monday morning, a majority of Supreme Court justices seemed poised to overrule a 90-year-old precedent validating multimember independent commissions, but it remains uncertain what limits — if any — the court may impose on the president's removal powers.

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau's acting Director Russell Vought has an obligation to request funding for the agency, five former Federal Reserve officials said. Plus, three nonprofits sue Vought and the CFPB.

While overall payments declined, the financial sector remained the top payer to cybercriminals, surpassing both health care and manufacturing.

Danny Seibel, who led First National Bank of Lindsay from 2007 until shortly before the bank's failure last year, is accused of falsifying bank documents to conceal the condition of loans.

JPMorgan's Ben Carpenter will join Evercore as a senior managing director; Wells Fargo appoints Jackie Krese to head syndications within its fund finance group; the SEC is probing Jefferies over its relationship to bankrupt auto parts supplier First Brands Group; and more in this week's banking news roundup.