Wall Street sign and a stoplight turned red - Photo by Roberto Júnior on Unsplash

Blog Post: Bank Lobbyist Nonsense About Capital Rules

The famously gruff Volcker had no patience for the arguments of the big-bank lobby against higher capital requirements and other regulations just after the 2008 financial crisis. An equally fitting word is “nonsense,” a favorite of Anat Admati, an economist at Stanford University, who has also applied it repeatedly since 2008.

Letters to Regulators: NCUA Budget for 2024-2025 Should Account for Climate-Related Financial Risk to Credit Unions and Consumer Protection Needs

Americans for Financial Reform Education Fund led and submitted a comment letter, to the NCUA on the agency’s draft 2024-2025 budget. The letter was endorsed by Green America, the National Coalition for Asian Pacific American Community Development, the National Fair Housing Alliance, New York Communities

News Release: Federal Home Loan Bank System to Undergo Major Public Benefit Reforms in Modern Era

Washington, D.C. — Upcoming reforms to the Federal Home Loan Bank System will provide greater and more equitable public benefits under a detailed roadmap released last week by their regulator, the Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA). The welcome reform agenda is the result of national engagement of stakeholders on FHLBanks, for-profit entities that receive significant indirect public subsidies.

News Release: More than 100 Organizations Agree: Rein in Big Banks’ Use of Forced Arbitration

Washington, D.C. – More than 100 consumer protection, civil rights and organized labor organizations filed a comment asking the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) to create a rule to restore the right of all Americans to decide to file a case in court rather than be forced into arbitration by big banks and other financial services corporations.

Congressional Testimony: Renita Marcellin, AFR’s Advocacy and Legislative Director, Testifies Before the HFSC, Financial Institutions and Monetary Policy Subcommittee

On November 7th, AFR’s Advocacy and Legislative Director Renita Marcellin testified before the House Financial Services Subcommittee on Financial Institutions and Monetary Policy supporting the Basel Endgame capital proposals. These capital proposals work to build a more resilient financial system and enable banks to better support the

Letters to Congress: AFR Letter for the Record in Opposition to a House Ways & Means Committee Anti-ESG Hearing

AFR wrote in opposition to the premise of the House Ways and Means Committee hearing titled “Ensuring what ‘Woke’ Doesn’t Leave Americans Broke: Protecting Seniors and Savers from ESG Activism.” This hearing is part of a much broader, unpopular campaign against common sense investment practices that seeks to force financial actors to ignore a slew of financial risks to the detriment of workers’ retirement security.