Category Archives: Education Fund

Letter to the Regulators: Letter to the SEC Supporting PCAOB’s Standardized Firm and Engagement Metrics

Americans for Financial Reform Education Fund, joined by 9 signatories, submitted a letter to the Securities and Exchange Commission strongly endorsing the Public Company Accounting Oversight Board’s (PCAOB) proposed standards. The standards would require firms to disclose standardized and comparable metrics that facilitate cross-firm comparisons and assessments of audit quality, providing critical data for investors to make informed decisions. The letter highlights that requiring consistent and comparative metrics will reduce opportunistic disclosures, simplify audit committee oversight, and foster a data-driven approach to regulation and audit quality.

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Letters to Congress: AFR Leads 25-Organization Letter Opposing Broad-Brush Congressional Attack on Federal Support for Homeownership, Small Businesses, and Family Farms

AFR and consumer, community, small business, and farm advocates sent a letter to the House Oversight and Accountability urging them to oppose legislation that aims to privatize federal loan guarantee programs. This measure would be a big win for Wall Street but reduce access, raise costs, and exacerbate racial gaps in homeownership rates, small business formation, and family farm viability.

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Letters to the Regulators: Letter to the SEC in Opposition to Private Credit Exchange Traded Fund

The Americans for Financial Reform Education Fund led a letter of 10 signers urging the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) to reject an application for a novel exchange traded fund (ETF) that would allow retail investors to invest in the $1.7 trillion private credit market. Several larger institutional investors have already taken losses in the private credit market and the letter warns how the presence of an institutional investment manager still fails to mitigate concerns around valuation, conflicts of interest, and suitability.

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Letters to Congress: AFR Joins Nearly 80 Environmental Groups Calling on Sen. Schumer to Block Climate-Destroying Crypto Legislation

AFR joined nearly 80 environmental and public interest advocates calling on Majority Leader Schumer to prevent the consideration of deeply flawed crypto legislation being discussed in the Senate Agriculture Committee because it would worsen climate emissions. Crypto is highly energy intensive and has already buoyed fossil fuel power plants, extraction, and climate emissions.

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Letters to the Regulators: Letter in Support of Urging Rulemaking for Tenant Protections Under the Equal Credit Opportunity Act

AFREF submitted a comment letter supporting the National Consumer Law Center’s petition urging the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau to define residential real estate leases as “credit” and landlords as “creditors” under the Equal Credit Opportunity Act. This petition for rulemaking addresses important components of the ongoing legacy of structural racism in credit and residential housing for people of color seeking rental leases to shelter their families and build a foundation for economic stability.

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Letters to the Regulators: AFREF and Allies Commend FDIC Effort to Regulate Industrial Loan Banks

AFREF, Consumer Federation of America, Prof. Arthur Wilmarth, Jr. and Center for Responsible Lending submitted a comment to the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation supporting the effort to strengthen the oversight of industrial loan companies (ILCs). The proposed rule would heighten scrutiny of new ILCs or attempts to take over existing ILCs that will more fully consider the unique risks of these banks.

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