FINANCIAL LEADERS

Dave Stevens – President and CEO, Mortgage Bankers Association
“The QM was the first rule to be released and its 804 pages of regulation alone will significantly change the landscape of homeownership.  Congress and the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau’s (CFPB) goal with this rule was to eliminate the risky products and features that once plagued our industry.  This rule accomplishes that and the CFPB is to be commended on the deliberative, inclusive, transparent process they undertook in creating this rule.”  January 16, 2013

“Cordray has proven himself to be an effective director and they have put out rule-makings that the industry is working to implement, and if they were suddenly overturned and the industry found itself in non-compliance, it could cause severe repercussions.” January 29, 2013

Jack Milligan – Editor, Bank Director magazine
“Here is what I think is good about the CFPB: It will help create a more level playing field between banks and nonbanks in those markets where they compete directly, primarily in the mortgage sector but also in student lending.” April 20, 2012

Ken Rees – President and CEO of Think Finance and former CEO of CashWorks, a nonbank provider of financial services with over 2,500 locations nationwide
“We are sure that the CFPB (like any other regulatory agency) may make decisions that we (and our industry) don’t agree with, but we have to give them credit for hiring a smart team of professionals and for establishing a positive attitude regarding the need for underbanked financial services, access to credit, and ongoing financial innovation.” June 14, 2012

Camden Fine – CEO of the Independent Community Bankers Association
“It’s refreshing that the CFPB seems to understand that when you’re dealing with certain products, those products are high-risk, and therefore the bank needs to be compensated.” April 13, 2012

“Not only are they open to discussions but they’re discussions that, whether or not they go anywhere, they’re handled in such a manner that you really do believe they could go somewhere. In other words, somebody is listening.” April 13, 2012

Jo Ann Barefoot – Co-chair of Treliant Risk Advisors
“I can’t point to a policy decision where I feel they have been unwilling to listen to the industry or intransigent. I think they avoided the original stereotype, which was to assume that the approach would be to find every practice they don’t like and create a regulation for it.”  January 4, 2013

Richard Hunt – President and CEO, Consumer Bankers Association
“To date this agency (the CFPB) has been the most accessible of any I’ve ever dealt with in this town.” July 19, 2012

“I’m pretty sure that if I needed Rich Cordray on a day’s notice, I’d get my call returned… It has nothing to do with me; I just think they’re that responsive.” April 1, 2012

Jamie Dimon, CEO, JP MorganChase
“I think they’ve done a great job… They started from ground zero and they are making real progress.” Specifically on the CFPB’s new mortgage rules: “They were good, they were thoughtful and they did it quickly…” January 24, 2013

Richard Booth – certified mortgage banker and industry consultant
“I, unlike, many of my colleagues do not see the CFPB as the enemy.  I see this new agency, and their objectives defined by Dodd-Frank, as an opportunity to improve lending and get the housing market moving.”  January 25, 2013

MEDIA (EDITORIALS AND COLUMNS)

Bloomberg
“Senate Republicans may have once had genuine fears about the CFPB and its potential to issue onerous and invasive rules. Those fears haven’t come to pass, and it’s getting harder to take them seriously. If senators take the same balanced and fair approach to their work as the CFPB has to its, they will confirm Cordray to a full term.” January 28, 2013

Martha C. White – Time Magazine
“For the average bank accountholder, credit card user, borrower — you know, pretty much all of us — the CFPB has done a lot in its short tenure to implement protections from fine print, legalese and even deception used to separate us from our dollars.” January 28, 2013

Adam Serwer – Mother Jones
“The CFPB was created as part of the 2010 financial regulation bill specifically to prevent financial institutions from engaging in the kind of exploitative practices that helped lead the country to the brink of economic collapse in 2008. Since January 2012, when Obama appointed former Ohio attorney general Richard Cordray to head the bureau, it has done exactly that—reigning in unscrupulous mortgage lenders, credit card companies, and debt servicers.” February 1, 2013

Paul Krugman – New York Times
“Here as elsewhere, they’re turning to extortion — threatening to filibuster the appointment of Richard Cordray, the bureau’s acting head, and thereby leave the bureau unable to function. Mr. Cordray, whose work has drawn praise even from the bankers, is clearly not the issue. Instead, it’s an open attempt to use raw obstructionism to overturn the law.” February 4, 2013

Adam Levin – Huffington Post
“Richard Cordray and the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau have won over a number of their toughest critics, including bank industry lawyers, credit unions lobbyists and mortgage industry trade groups who say the bureau has impressed them with the depth of its knowledge and the fairness of its decisions.” January 28, 2013