team, Author at Americans for Financial Reform

In The News: A reckoning for SPACs: will regulators deflate the boom? (Financial Times)

In February, a letter sent to the House Financial Services Committee by the progressive non-profit Americans for Financial Reform called on Congress to expand the blank-cheque company definition and amend securities law to exclude SPAC mergers from liability protections. “As long as there’s money to be made in every part of the SPAC issuance process, I don’t expect to see changes unless you start to see some more scrutiny,” says Andrew Park, senior policy analyst at AFR.

News Release: New Bank Regulator Leadership Welcome; Congress Still Must Roll Back Rule Promoting Predatory Lending

Advocates welcomed reports that Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen plans to appoint a new acting head of the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC), replacing Blake Paulson, in light of the highly deceptive and false claims that the agency, under Paulson’s leadership, put forward as Congress debates overturning the OCC’s “fake lender” rule.

Letter to Congress: Small Business Advocacy Organization Support CRA Challenge of OCC “True Lender” Rule

Small business advocacy organizations, representing tens of thousands of affiliated small businesses and the interests of the 30 million small businesses in the country, submitted a letter to Congress expressing strong support for Senate Joint Resolution 15, the Congressional Review Act Resolution to repeal the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency’s True Lender Rule.

News Release: Dumping Bad-Actor Big Banks? New Report Shows How

A new report shows how American individuals and municipalities can move money away from bad-actor big banks, which are increasingly losing trust and support among Americans because of policies that undermine communities, damage the environment, and harm poor folks and people of color. While the idea of breaking up with big banks has become increasingly popular, the practicalities of doing so can seem prohibitive.

photo of Wall Street sign in NYC | Photo by Chris Li on Unsplash

Report: Breaking Up With Bad Banks

Despite wanting to move their money, many consumers have found that it can be quite difficult to switch. Banks have deliberately made the process of switching more complicated than it needs to be. Cities and municipalities have faced even greater difficulties in moving their money to community banks and credit unions. There are changes that can be made that would give consumers a real choice by making it easier for them to switch banks and would make it easier for municipalities to move their money.

Letters to the Regulator: Letter to the SEC on Conditional Substituted Compliance for Non US Swap Dealers and Participants

AFR submitted a comment letter to the Securities and Exchange Commission supporting the Commission’s proposals to require foreign security-based swap dealers and participants to abide by the SEC’s own set of capital and initial margin requirements as opposed to the less stringent Basel capital requirements.

Congressional Testimony: Testimony of Lisa Donner Before the United States Senate Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs

Executive Director Lisa Donner testified at Senate Banking’s hearing “The Dignity of Work.”

Letters to Congress: Call to Update the FTC’s Enforcement Tools

AFR joined a letter calling on Congress to update the FTC’s enforcement tools under the FTC Act, Section 13(b).

Take Action: Congress, Close Loophole That Allows Lenders to Evade State Interest Rate Caps

Legislation, proposed by Sens. Van Hollen and Brown along with Rep. Chuy Garcia of Illinois would rescind the Trump-era rule and reestablish states’ right to protect their residents with interest rate caps.

News Release: Bipartisan Group of 25 State Attorneys General Urge Congress to Repeal OCC “True Lender” Rule

In a rare form of bipartisan agreement, a group of 25 Attorneys General (AGs) sent a letter today to Congressional leadership urging it to “use the Congressional Review Act (CRA) to rescind the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency’s (OCC’s) “True Lender” rule in order to “safeguard states’ fundamental sovereign rights to protect their citizens from financial abuse.”