“It is disappointing that the Commission has not already taken such steps. But a call from the people and the State of Illinois could and should spur the SEC to action to recover for the public big-bank gains that resulted from violations of their obligations to do business in a fair and transparent way with these public-sector clients. “
In his final State of the Union address, President Obama reminded the nation that “food stamp recipients didn’t cause the financial crisis; Wall Street recklessness did.” While he did not linger on the subject, the totality of his remarks made a strong case for measures to make the financial system safer and fairer. We agree about the need for such measures, and we laud the progress that has already been made. But, as we enter the final year of this administration, there is more that needs to be done.
“Public Justice, working as counsel to Americans for Financial Reform, announced today that it has won a motion to unseal court documents showing how AMG Services, Inc., the payday lending business owned by magnate Scott Tucker, deceived borrowers about the total amount their loans would cost. The carefully orchestrated scheme netted Tucker and his associates at least $1.32 billion out of the pockets of hard-pressed borrowers.”
“The omnibus government spending bill made public this morning did not include the dangerous financial deregulatory riders that Wall Street and its allies had been promoting. Financial industry lobbyists and their friends in Congress pushed hard to use this ‘must pass’ legislation to achieve a number of unrelated, unpopular, and destructive policy goals… They failed. The defeat of these proposals is a credit to the determined opposition of key leaders in the House, the Senate, and the Administration, and to the effective organizing and advocacy of groups around the country.”
“Repeat a preposterous story often enough, and maybe someday you’ll get a few people to believe it. That could be the theory behind the campaign to depict the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) as an NSA-style spy agency and a threat to liberty.”
“We support the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau’s (CFPB) acquisition and analysis of commercial databases to help it ensure the public is fairly treated by the financial marketplace.
As leaders of consumer and privacy organizations, we agree that the CFPB needs to use the wide range of data available to financial institutions and services in order to identify best practices and necessary safeguards.”
“Forced arbitration clauses deny American consumers and workers of the right to hold corporations accountable. Instead of going to court, these clauses force consumer claims into private arbitration that favors the corporation. Corporations write the arbitration rules, even choosing the arbitration firm and the location for the proceeding. Forced arbitration is thus a parallel system of dispute resolution created by and for corporations and explicitly designed to protect their interests above all else.”
Ten euro-zone countries, including Germany and France, outlined the key points of their broad consensus on a harmonized transaction tax… ‘We are happy to see Europe moving forward on this critical financial reform and urge U.S. policymakers to follow suit,’ said Lisa Donner, Executive Director of Americans for Financial Reform. “
Today, CREDO Action, Americans for Financial Reform, Public Citizen, USAction and USPIRG delivered petitions in which more than 200,000 Americans told Congress not to let the budget process be used as a vehicle for backdoor financial deregulation.
“We welcome the news… that 1,312 former students of Heald College – part of predatory for-profit chain Corinthian Colleges Inc. – will finally see the debt cancellation they have long been promised. But we remain gravely concerned by the Department’s unjustifiably narrow approach to debt cancellation, which if it continues unchanged may leave hundreds of thousands of students burdened with debts foisted on them by deceptive and abusive practices.”