A coalition of 61 consumer, civil rights, and community groups today sent letters to three federal bank regulators urging them not to allow their banks to help payday lenders evade state interest rate limits.
View or download a PDF version of the letter. November 7, 2019 Dear Representative: We are writing on behalf of Americans for Financial Reform (AFR) concerning the reauthorization bill for the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) that was passed last week by the House Agriculture
By most accounts, FACEBOOK CEO Mark Zuckerberg fared poorly at a recent hearing in the House Financial Services Committee. This is perhaps especially true with respect to questions about FACEBOOK’s Libra project—the technotrust’s ambitious attempt to mint “real money” for worldwide use.
A video obtained by consumer watchdog groups Allied Progress and Americans for Financial Reform shows payday industry executives bluntly discussing how campaign contributions to the Trump campaign has bought them access to his administration. In a recent webinar, predatory lenders reveal their plan for using campaign cash to lock in a final CFPB payday rule that enriches them at consumers’ expense.
“We have here a striking example of how money in American politics leads to the abuse of consumers in the financial services marketplace,” said Linda Jun, senior policy counsel at Americans for Financial Reform.
Small business advocates, consumer groups, and civil-rights advocates today sent a letter to the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. (FDIC) and the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC) criticizing the agencies’ decision to file an amicus brief supporting a predatory small business lender that used a bank to evade state interest rate laws so that it could make a 120% annual percentage rate (APR) $550,000 loan.
Coalition letter in support of the Consumer Credit Control Act.
AFR Language Access Task Force and partner organizations sent up a letter in support of legislation to restore the URLA language preference question.
The AFR Education Fund wrote to the FDIC urging them to maintain comprehensive disclosure requirements for securitizations that are backed by depository banks. The agency is proposing to exempt private offerings from these requirements. Most of the toxic mortgage securitizations sold prior to the financial crisis were private offerings.
“When Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg testifies before Congress this week, he’ll likely try to justify the launch of the Libra cryptocurrency in the face of regulatory attempts to block it. But make no mistake: This project is an effort to mint a global supercurrency — and harness power beyond government reach.” Raúl Carrillo, Americans for Financial Reform Education Fund and Demand Progress Education Fund