On July 21, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau turned five years old. In a joint statement, AFR and 25 allied organizations celebrated the bureau’s accomplishments. The AFR coalition also marked the occasion by hosting a breakfast event at the downtown Washington offices of the National
At Center for American Progress event, Lisa Donner assesses the accomplishments and promise of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau.
“Do private funds drive positive change and improve efficiency? Or do they drive short-termism, job losses and systemic risk in our markets? Regulators have only just begun to shine a light on these funds, revealing a host of problems and raising many more questions about their operations. “
“Join Senator Sherrod Brown, Senator Elizabeth Warren, and Mehrsa Baradaran, Associate Professor at the University of Georgia School of Law, for a discussion of her new book, How the Other Half Banks: Exclusion, Exploitation, and the Threat to Democracy, and its implications for addressing American inequality. Baradaran’s book explores how American banks fail to serve nearly half of Americans, the abandoned public mission of banking, and the reality of banking inequality in the US.”
“Wall Street remains dominated by giant banks that have only grown larger since the 2008 financial crisis. The existence of these ‘too big to fail’ banks can distort markets and presents a risk to the public that may once again be called on to bail them out. Section 165 of the Dodd-Frank Act takes on this problem by requiring banks to submit resolution plans which demonstrate that they are not ‘too big to fail’ – that in case of failure they can be resolved through a conventional bankruptcy process. If they cannot demonstrate this, regulators must require banks to simplify and downsize their operations.”
“Wall Street remains dominated by giant banks that have only grown larger since the 2008 financial crisis. The existence of these ‘too big to fail’ banks can distort markets and presents a risk to the public that may once again be called on to bail them out. Section 165 of the Dodd-Frank Act takes on this problem by requiring banks to submit resolution plans which demonstrate that they are not ‘too big to fail’ – that in case of failure they can be resolved through a conventional bankruptcy process. If they cannot demonstrate this, regulators must require banks to simplify and downsize their operations.”
“The University of Georgia School of Law is sponsoring an important panel on America’s banking system at the National Press Club in Washington. Panelists Simon Johnson ( Ronald A. Kurtz [1954] Professor of Entrepreneurship at the MIT Sloan School of Management and author of 13 Bankers and White House Burning); Lisa Donner (Executive Director, Americans for Financial Reform) and Mehrsa Baradaran (Associate Professor of Law, University of Georgia, and author of the new book How the Other Half Banks) will be in conversation, moderated by David Dayen.”
Recent months have seen increasing claims by some industry participants and their allies that new regulations are negatively impacting bond market liquidity in ways that may harm the economy. What is the truth of these claims? Is there in fact a serious problem with bond market liquidity? Are recent market events such as the October 15th Treasury market disruption related to new regulation, or to other market changes such as increases in electronic trading? How should regulators respond?
Senators Sherrod Brown and Elizabeth Warren joined regulators and experts for a discussion of the progress made, and the work yet to be done, in building a financial system that is safer and fairer and does a better job of serving the real economy and the country as a whole.
AFR organized a briefing for Senate Banking staff on the regulation of large regional banks and the potential risks to the financial system that could emerge if regulatory authority over these banks is significantly diminished. AFR Policy Director Marcus Stanley and Professor Heidi Schooner of the Catholic University School of Law presented at the briefing.