“A financial disclosure report that Jay Clayton filed with the government reveals clients that pose potential conflicts of interest for the SEC job. They include financial industry powerhouses Goldman Sachs , Deutsche Bank, Barclays and UBS… ‘This is a sort of Who’s Who of Wall Street,’ said Marcus Stanley, policy director for Americans for Financial Reform… ‘I would think that this would force quite a lot of recusals…’”
“Wall Street pumped $2.1 billion into the political process in 2015-2016, according to a new report by Americans for Financial Reform. Big banks, hedge funds and other financial giants contributed $1.1 billion to political campaigns in the last election cycle, and spent $898 million on lobbying in Washington. The report draws on a special data set AFR obtained. We don’t know how much ‘dark money’ that Wall Street put into American politics, so these are extremely conservative numbers.”
“In a July poll [commissioned by Americans for Financial Reform and the Center for Responsible Lending], 79 percent of Democrats and 67 percent of Republicans said they supported the bureau’s mission. The election result doesn’t appear to have changed their views. In December, more than half of Trump voters opposed efforts to weaken the consumer agency.”
“‘How long can industry lobbyists get away with saying Dodd-Frank has harmed lending and harmed profits in the banking industry when the numbers go completely the other way?’ said Marcus Stanley, a policy director at Americans for Financial Reform.
The increase included a 5.1 percent rise in commercial and industrial loans, a 7.5 percent gain in commercial real estate loans and a 4.8 percent uptick in residential mortgages, the FDIC said in its quarterly banking profile.”
“Consumer advocates pushed back against Mr. Trump’s statement. ‘Directory Cordray has been an effective and responsible head of the CFPB,’
said Lisa Donner, executive director of Americans for Financial Reform. ‘Under his leadership it has been accountable to the American people, delivering over $12 billion in relief for more than 29 million people, a publicly searchable complaint system, and rules of the road to make lending fairer.’”
“A U.S. appeals court in Washington on Thursday granted the CFPB’s request to reconsider an October decision that stripped Cordray of his job protection, which left him at the mercy of Trump and a pro-business Republican-led Congress… Also weighing in on behalf of the CFPB are Americans for Financial Reform, the Consumer Federation of America, the U.S. Public Interest Research Group and one of the bureau’s biggest proponents, Democratic Senator Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts.”
“’People know that financial companies were running amok, and that kind of behavior takes money out of people’s pockets and was the cause of a financial crisis,’ said Lisa Donner, executive director of Americans for Financial Reform. ‘President Trump campaigned on standing up to Wall Street, and I don’t think his voters are looking for putting Goldman Sachs even more in charge.’”
“‘Steve Mnuchin said his bank did not robo-sign. Now we have yet another round of evidence that it did,” said Lisa Donner, executive director of Americans for Financial Reform. ‘The public deserves clear answers, and all senators should be demanding them. We do not need, and they should not support, a Treasury Secretary who thinks the rules do not apply to himself or to his partners on Wall Street.’”
“‘The administration apparently plans to turn over financial regulation to Wall Street titan Goldman Sachs, and make it easier for them and other big banks like Wells Fargo to steal from their customers and destabilize the economy,’ said Lisa Donner, executive director of Americans for Financial Reform, an advocacy group that supports Dodd-Frank. ‘That betrays the promises Trump made to stand up to Wall Street, and it will have dire consequences if he’s successful.’”
“[The CFPB] has been fulfilling its mission, without letting itself be cowed by Wall Street or captured by revolving-door insiders. That’s why it’s under attack, and why it urgently needs to be defended.”