In the first twelve months of the 2017-18 election cycle, Wall Street banks and financial interests have reported spending $719 million to influence decision-making through campaign contributions and lobbying. That total works out to about $2.0 million a day. The financial sector is by far the largest source of campaign contributions in federal elections, and the third largest spender on lobbying
Statement from Marcus Stanley, policy director, Americans for Financial Reform: “The proposal we heard described today does not come close to measuring up. The standard of conduct the agency has articulated appears ambiguous at best. It doesn’t simply ban the sales quotas and other compensation practices that lead brokers to put their clients into high-fee, lower-yielding investments.”
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.
Washington, DC – Friday at noon, DC activists will rally to close the egregious carried interest loophole outside private equity firm The Carlyle Group.
AFR sent a letter to members of the House of Representatives urging them to vote in opposition to H.R. 4263, the “Regulation A+ Improvement Act”.
AFR sent a letter urging House members to vote “No” on H.R. 4296—a bill that would tie regulators hands in setting operational risk capital.
On the first anniversary of the Trump administration, the Take on Wall Street coalition catalogs the ways that Wall Street made bank on Trump in 2017.
From tax cuts to deregulation to changes at the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, the first year of the Trump administration has been a boon to Wall Street at the expense of ordinary Americans.
The report includes facts about lobbying spending that hit $2 billion in the last election cycle, and continues unabated, Wall Street executives in the Trump administration and regulatory agencies, tax cut windfalls for the finance industry, and a deregulatory free-for-all. It also includes a case study of how Wells Fargo’s outrageous conduct somehow earned it the distinction of being the biggest winner from the Trump-Republican tax bill.
AFR sent a letter to the House Financial Services Committee opposing a dozen bills that would deregulate banks and strip away consumer and investor protections.