AFR in the News Archives - Page 38 of 58 - Americans for Financial Reform

AFR in the News: They Have Very Short Memories

“House Republicans, Senate Democrats and President Obama have found something they can all support: a terrible package of bills that would undo essential investor protections, reduce market transparency and distort the efficient allocation of capital. …Dozens of legal experts and advocates for investors and consumers have written to Senate leaders warning that extensive revisions must be made to the House legislation for it to be even minimally acceptable.”

AFR in the News: Not What Paul Volcker Had in Mind

“The Volcker rule, a crucial provision of the Dodd-Frank financial reform law, is supposed to stop banks from doing the sort of risky trading that was one of the big causes of the financial meltdown. The banks hate the rule because less speculation means less profit and lower bonuses for traders and bank executives. …Some advocates also warn that the regulations could still be read as allowing proprietary trading that is longer term in nature, including high-risk arbitrage trades that attempt to profit on price differences among similar assets.”

AFR in the News: Protect your investments from oil shocks

“The last time we saw this speculative feeding frenzy was in 2008, when in July, amidst the meltdown in the credit and housing markets, speculators wildly ran up the price of crude oil to over $140 per barrel. Was the steroidal price explosion in 2008 due to increased demand or a significant reduction in supply? Trading volume was nearly 15 times world oil demand that year, according to research compiled by Americans for Financial Reform.”

AFR in the News: A bipartisan push to bring back bank bailouts

“Advocates on the left, however, are adamant that the ban remain in place, arguing that it forces banks to put up greater collateral to back up risky bets. ‘It is a form of firewall between swaps dealing and the rest of your operations, requiring separate capitalization,’ says Marcus Stanley, policy director of Americans for Financial Reform. ‘When you allow banks to do absolutely unlimited derivatives activities, it’s hard to separate banking from speculation.'”

AFR in the News: House Panel Approves Bill to Exempt New Firms From Pay Votes

“On Feb. 16, the U.S. House Financial Services Committee voted overwhelmingly to approve a bill that would exempt newly public companies from holding say-on-pay votes for five years. …Americans for Financial Reform (AFR), a coalition of consumer and investor groups that includes the AFL-CIO, has urged the Senate Banking Committee to reject the emerging company legislation. The coalition criticized the auditor attestation exemption and noted that say-on-pay votes have nothing to do with eliminating barriers to new IPOs.”

AFR in the News: Opening Up the Fed

“Fed board members and staff members apparently met with JPMorgan Chase 16 times, Bank of America 10 times, Goldman Sachs nine times, Barclays seven times and Morgan Stanley seven times (as depicted in a chart that accompanies the Wall Street Journal article). How many meetings does a single company need on one specific issue? How many would you get? For example, Americans for Financial Reform, an organization that describes itself as ‘fighting for a banking and financial system based on accountability, fairness and security,’ met with senior Federal Reserve officials only three times on the Volcker Rule.”

AFR in the News: U.S. House Panel Approves Measure Limiting Swaps ‘Push-Out’

“The U.S. House Financial Services Committee approved legislation that would let banks keep commodity and equity derivatives in federally-insured units by removing part of the Dodd-Frank Act’s so-called push-out rule. …Americans for Financial Reform, a coalition including the AFL-CIO labor federation as well as other unions and consumer advocacy groups, opposed changes to the push-out rule in a letter before the vote.”

AFR in the News: Comments Flood In on Volcker Rule

The so-called Volcker Rule has broken the record for attracting the most comment letters submitted on any Dodd-Frank proposal. Regulators have received a whopping 17,000-plus comments on the proposal, a Federal Reserve spokeswoman said. …Behind this deluge is a partnership of two consumer advocacy groups that have been active in pushing back against the banks during the Dodd-Frank rule-writing process. Public Citizen and Americans for Financial Reform used email lists and social media such as Twitter and Facebook to recruit members and others to submit comments on the Volcker Rule.

AFR in the News: The Volcker Rule’s Unusual Critics

“What does Goldman Sachs have in common with Red Lobster and Macy’s? They all loathe the Volcker Rule. …An array of supporters of the proposed rule, including Mr. Volcker himself, pushed back against the escalating rhetoric. ‘This criticism is deeply misguided,’ Americans for Financial Reform, a nonprofit group that favors Wall Street regulation, said in a comment letter. The group said that too much of a good thing, or ‘excessive market liquidity,’ drove the financial system to the brink of collapse in 2008.”

AFR in the News: 14,479 letters supporting the Volcker Rule

“This public support for Volcker is the outgrowth of a letter-writing campaign by Americans for Financial Reform, Public Citizen, and other advocacy groups that have lobbied to defend and strengthen Dodd-Frank. Since Dodd-Frank was passed, regulators have invited the public to weigh in on the new rules before turning the blueprints into final law.”