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Letter to Regulators: AFR Calls on IRS to Close Tax Loopholes for Private Equity Firms

“The undersigned organizations are writing to provide comments to the Treasury Department (“Treasury”) and the Internal Revenue Service (“IRS”) on the proposed regulations relating to disguised payments for services between private equity partnerships and partners under Section 707(a)(2)(A) of the Internal Revenue Code. We strongly support the proposed regulations to close the loopholes in the tax code that permit private equity firms to lower their taxes by converting management fees, typically taxed as ordinary income, into capital gains. “

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Letters to Congress: AFR, 30 Consumer Advocacy Groups Oppose Harmful Changes to Dodd-Frank, Oppose HR 1210

“The undersigned organizations write to urge you to oppose H.R. 1210 (the “Portfolio Lending and Mortgage Access Act”). This bill makes two harmful changes to the Dodd–Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act (Dodd-Frank Act) and its implementing regulations: It takes a special exemption designed for more trustworthy small and rural banks and extends it to all banks, regardless of size or trustworthiness and it substantially weakens the Act’s ban on loan steering—a practice that supports predatory lending and racial discrimination.”

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Letter to Congress: AFR, 65 Organizations Urge Congress to Stand Against Discriminatory Auto Lending and Reject HR 1737

“On behalf of the undersigned organizations, we urge you to oppose H.R. 1737, the so-called “Reforming CFPB Indirect Auto Financing Guidance Act.” This legislation is simply an effort to stop the CFPB from enforcing laws against discrimination… H.R. 1737 hides its intent behind a smokescreen of claims about process and regulatory jurisdiction. However, the bill is really about the unfair and discriminatory impact of car dealer interest rate markups. The bill is a misguided attack on the CFPB’s enforcement of anti-discrimination laws.”

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AFR Event: How the Other Half Banks

“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.”

AFR Event: Can Regulators End Too Big To Fail? A Discussion of Dodd-Frank Resolution Planning

“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.”

AFR Event: Can Regulators End Too Big To Fail? A Discussion of Dodd-Frank Resolution Planning

“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.”

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AFR in the News: Budget deal offers way to sneak through financial changes (USA Today)

“”The industry’s agenda is far-reaching,” [AFR’s Jim] Lardner wrote in U.S. News & World Report. ‘But the riders all share a common purpose: They would make it easier for banks and financial companies to exploit us, whether by cheating consumers, engaging in reckless bets or using taxpayer subsidies to generate windfall profits for a handful of giant institutions and a narrow financial elite.'”