FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE April 11, 2018 CONTACT: Carter Dougherty, carter@ourfinancialsecurity.org, (202) 251-6700 Consumer Groups Launch Website Tracking Mick Mulvaney’s Anti-Consumer Actions WASHINGTON, D.C. – Today, as Mick Mulvaney, the unlawfully appointed Acting Director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB), testifies before the House Financial
AFR sent a letter to Congress opposing a bill that would massively undermine the oversight of non-bank financial companies that are crucial to financial stability.
AFR sent a letter to Congress opposing a bill that would severely weaken stress testing–a key element of bank supervision and oversight.
“Payday lenders have spent millions lobbying for rules that would let them exploit consumers, so it’s no surprise they are launching a lawsuit against the CFPB rule, which is about the most sensible consumer protection imaginable. It would require lenders to assess a borrower’s ability to repay a loan so they don’t fall into a cycle of debt, nothing more,” said Lisa Donner, Executive Director, Americans for Financial Reform.
Americans for Financial Reform wrote to the Department of Education to voice concerns with two applications they have proposed for higher education institutions seeking access to emergency relief funds. In addition to creating barriers to accessing the funds, the forms are not available in Spanish, which will preclude potential applicants in Puerto Rico from accessing needed funds.
“Like other federal regulators, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau is supposed to give regular updates to Congress on the work it has done to fulfill its statutory mandate. Under Mick Mulvaney, the consumer watchdog has used its just-released semiannual report for a very different purpose: to urge Congress to take away its power to fulfill that mandate.”
As the Trump administration rolls back the greater regulatory scrutiny the for-profit college industry has faced during the last several years, it is private equity that stands to benefit the most, posing continuing dangers to students, taxpayers, and the integrity of the federal financial aid system.
A new report from Americans for Financial Reform and the Private Equity Stakeholder Project documents how the private equity industry has driven the growth — and abuses — of the for-profit higher education industry.
The regulators must act on the same principles in approaching fiduciary rulemakings; anything less leaves investors vulnerable to losing billions of dollars a year to ‘advisors’ who pitch investments that produce greater returns for themselves, but leave the clients earning less.