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  • CFPB formalizes “Compliance Aids” policy

    Agency Rule-Making & Guidance

    On January 27, the CFPB published a policy statement announcing a new designation for certain guidance material. The non-binding “Compliance Aids” are intended to assist financial institutions when complying with laws and regulations, but are not rules, and are therefore exempt from the Administrative Procedures Act’s notice and comment rulemaking requirements. According to the Bureau, while the Compliance Aids may include practical suggestions for entities, the Bureau notes that “[w]here there are multiple methods of compliance that are permitted by the applicable rules and statutes, an entity can make its own business decision regarding which method to use, and this may include a method that is not specifically addressed in a Compliance Aid. In sum, regulated entities are not required to comply with the Compliance Aids themselves. Regulated entities are only required to comply with the underlying rules and statutes.” The policy statement is effective February 1.

    Agency Rule-Making & Guidance CFPB Compliance Compliance Aids

  • CFPB issues statement intended to clarify “abusive” practices

    Agency Rule-Making & Guidance

    On January 24, the CFPB issued a policy statement applicable immediately to provide a “common-sense framework” for how the Bureau plans to apply the “abusiveness” standard in supervision and enforcement matters as authorized under Dodd-Frank. Under the new policy statement, the Bureau will only cite or challenge conduct as abusive if the agency “concludes that the harms to consumers from the conduct outweigh its benefits to consumers.” The Bureau will also generally avoid challenging conduct as abusive if it relies on all, or nearly all, of the same facts alleged to be unfair or deceptive. Should the Bureau include abusiveness allegations, the policy statement says it will “plead such claims in a manner designed to clearly demonstrate the nexus between the cited facts and the Bureau’s legal analysis of the claim.” With respect to supervision, the Bureau intends to clarify the specific factual basis for determining a violation of the abusiveness standard. In addition, “the Bureau generally does not intend to seek certain types of monetary relief for abusiveness violations” in instances where the Bureau determines that the person made “a good-faith effort to comply with the abusiveness standard.” However, the Bureau cautions that it will still pursue restitution for consumers in such instances, regardless of whether a person acted in good faith. The Bureau further emphasized that the issuance of the policy statement does not prevent the possibility of future rulemaking to further define the abusiveness standard.

    As previously covered by InfoBytes, last June the Bureau held a symposium to examine how the “abusive” standard has been used in practice in the field. Academics and practitioners discussed whether consumer harm was required for a practice to be considered abusive or whether there was even a need to clarify the abusive standard, as it is already statutorily defined. Most panelists agreed that a guidance document or policy statement would be an important first step for the Bureau in providing clarity to the industry, noting that the industry has struggled with examples of how abusiveness is different from unfairness or deception and that the Bureau has been “inconsistent at times” in the application of the abusive standard. The Bureau notes that the symposium, along with stakeholder feedback, played an important part of the process leading to the issuance of the policy statement.

    Agency Rule-Making & Guidance CFPB UDAAP Abusive

  • Two whistleblowers earn SEC awards totaling $322,000

    Securities

    On January 22, the SEC announced that it had awarded a total of $322,000 to two whistleblowers in two separate enforcement actions. According to the SEC’s press release, the whistleblowers “played a crucial role in helping the Commission protect Main Street investors,” and “assisted the SEC in returning money to harmed investors.” One whistleblower provided information that reportedly helped the agency “shut down an ongoing fraudulent scheme that was preying on retail investors,” and was awarded $277,000 (see award order here). The other whistleblower, a harmed investor, assisted the agency to “shut down a fraudulent scheme targeting retail investors.” The whistleblower was awarded $45,000 (see award order here). Since 2012, the SEC whistleblower program has awarded roughly $387 million to 72 whistleblowers.

    Securities Agency Rule-Making & Guidance Whistleblower SEC Enforcement Regulator Enforcement

  • Treasury seeks information on financial sector cybersecurity risks

    Agency Rule-Making & Guidance

    On January 22, the Department of the Treasury published a request for comments on a proposed information collection designed to better understand cybersecurity risks facing the U.S. financial services sector and financial services critical infrastructure. The “Financial Sector Critical Infrastructure Cybersecurity Survey,” issued by the Department’s Office of Cybersecurity and Critical Infrastructure Protection (OCCIP), seeks feedback on ways to enhance resilience within the financial services sector and reduce operational risk. The proposal will also support OCCIP efforts to work collaboratively with industry and interagency partners on these strategies. Comments are due March 23.

    Agency Rule-Making & Guidance Department of Treasury Privacy/Cyber Risk & Data Security

  • FHFA raises annual CFI cap

    Agency Rule-Making & Guidance

    On January 22, the Federal Housing Finance Agency published its annual adjustment to the cap on average total assets used to determine whether a Federal Home Loan Bank member qualifies as a community financial institution (CFI). The new cap is $1,224,000,000. Under the Federal Home Loan Bank Act, insured depository institutions that qualify as a CFI receive certain advantages in qualifying for bank membership and the ability to receive and collateralize long-term advances. The adjustment took effect January 1.

    Agency Rule-Making & Guidance FHFA Community Banks FHLB

  • Federal Reserve vice chairman discusses supervision

    Agency Rule-Making & Guidance

    On January 17, Federal Reserve Vice Chair for Supervision Randal K. Quarles spoke before the American Bar Association Banking Law Committee meeting in Washington, D.C. on bank supervision and ways to improve transparency, efficiency, and effectiveness. With respect to supervision, Quarles said that the Fed’s communication with supervised banks could be improved and made several specific proposals in the areas of large bank supervision, transparency improvements, and overall supervisory process improvements. In terms of large bank supervision, Quarles discussed how banks are added to the list of complex institutions overseen by the Large Institution Supervision Coordinating Committee (LISCC), particularly with respect to decreases in foreign banking organizations’ (FBOs) size and risk profiles. According to Quarles, over the past decade, four foreign banks have significantly shrunk their presence in the U.S. and reduced risk within their U.S. operations. As a result, these banks’ “estimated systemic impact” is now much smaller than that of the U.S. global systemically important banks. Moving these FBOs to a lower category, he noted, would allow the firms to be supervised alongside other foreign and domestic firms with similar risk profiles. However Quarles emphasized that any changes in these four FBOs’ supervisory portfolios “would have no effect on the regulatory capital or liquidity requirements that currently apply.” Quarles also discussed the Fed’s stress capital buffer proposal—which “will give banks significantly more time to review their stress test results and understand their capital requirements before we demand their final capital plan”—noting that the Fed continues to research ways to “reduce the volatility of stress-test requirements from year to year.”

    Concerning transparency, Quarles stated, among other things, that he supports submitting significant supervisory guidance documents with Congress for the purposes of the Congressional Review Act, as it already does with new rules. Quarles also proposed the creation of a database of all significant agency rules and interpretations and seeking public comments on significant supervisory guidance before it is issued. Finally, Quarles said the Fed hopes to maintain “firm and fair supervision” by (i) increasing the ability of supervised firms to share confidential supervisory information; (ii) adopting a rule on the use of guidance in the supervisory process; (iii) restoring the “‘supervisory observation’ category for lesser safety and soundness issues”; and (iv) limiting the use of future Matters Requiring Attention to violations of law, violations of regulation, and material safety and soundness issues.

    Agency Rule-Making & Guidance Federal Reserve Supervision Of Interest to Non-US Persons Foreign Banks

  • FTC settles with credit repair companies

    Federal Issues

    On January 17, the FTC announced it had reached settlements with a number of defendants alleged to have operated “an unlawful credit repair scam that has deceived consumers across the country.” According to the FTC’s complaint, the defendants purportedly made false representations to consumers regarding their abilities to improve credit scores, falsely promised to remove any negative entries on the consumers’ credit reports, illegally collected upfront fees from consumers before the services were fully performed, and used threats and coercion to intimidate consumers from disputing charges. The FTC alleged these misleading statements and illegal actions violated TILA, the FTC Act, the Telemarketing Act, and the Credit Repair Organizations Act, among other things. Additionally, the FTC claimed that the defendants “routinely engage in electronic fund transfers from consumers’ bank accounts without obtaining proper authorization, and use remotely created checks to pay for credit repair services they have offered through a telemarketing campaign, in violation of the TSR.” The defendants, without admitting or denying the allegations, agreed to settlements that ban the defendants from offering credit repair services through “advertising, marketing, promoting, offering for sale, or selling,” impose a total monetary penalty of nearly $14 million, and require several defendants to turn over the contents of bank and merchant accounts as well as investment and cryptocurrency accounts. See the settlements here, here, and here.

    Federal Issues Agency Rule-Making & Guidance Settlement Enforcement FTC FTC Act TILA TSR CROA Telemarketing Sales Rule Telemarketing and Consumer Fraud and Abuse Prevention Act Credit Repair

  • Kraninger outlines plan to extend GSE patch, previews QM Rule

    Agency Rule-Making & Guidance

    According to sources, on January 17, CFPB Director Kathy Kraninger sent a letter to prominent members of Congress announcing plans to extend the qualified mortgage patch—which exempts loans eligible for purchase by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac (GSEs) from the Qualified Mortgage (QM) Rule’s 43 percent debt-to-income (DTI) ratio—for a short period beyond its current January 2021 expiration. As previously covered by a Buckley Special Alert, the Bureau issued an Advance Notice of Proposed Rulemaking last July to solicit feedback on, among other things, whether the DTI limit should be altered and how Regulation Z and the Ability to Repay/QM Rule should be amended to minimize disruption from the so-called GSE patch expiration. Kraninger notes in her letter that the Bureau plans to propose an amendment to the QM Rule to replace DTI ratios as a factor in mortgage underwriting with an alternative measure of credit risk. One alternative, Kraninger says, could be to use pricing thresholds based on the difference between the loan’s annual percentage rate and the average prime offer rate for a similar loan. The Bureau is also considering adding a “seasoning” approach through a separate rulemaking process to give safe harbor to certain loans when the borrower has made timely payments for a certain period, Kraninger states. Sources report that the Bureau plans to issue a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking no later than May.

    Agency Rule-Making & Guidance CFPB Ability To Repay Qualified Mortgage Mortgages Senate Banking Committee Fannie Mae Freddie Mac Regulation Z GSE

  • OCC releases December enforcement actions

    Federal Issues

    On January 16, the OCC released a list of recent enforcement actions taken against national banks, federal savings associations, and individuals currently and formerly affiliated with such entities. The new enforcement actions include formal agreements, prohibition orders, and terminations of existing enforcement actions against individuals and banks. Included among the actions is a formal agreement issued against an Illinois-based bank on December 18 for alleged unsafe or unsound practices relating to, among other things, consumer compliance. The agreement requires the bank to (i) establish a compliance committee to monitor the bank’s progress in complying with the agreement’s provisions; (ii) report such progress to the bank’s board on a quarterly basis; and (iii) implement a written consumer compliance program. This program must also include a policies and procedures manual that covers all consumer protection laws, rules, and regulations to which the bank should adhere, an independent audit program, and training of bank personnel in the consumer protection laws, rules, and regulations as appropriate.

    Federal Issues Agency Rule-Making & Guidance Bank Compliance Enforcement OCC

  • FHFA seeks comments on PACE loans

    Agency Rule-Making & Guidance

    On January 16, the FHFA issued a notice requesting public comment on prospective policy changes to its residential energy retrofitting programs, or Property Assessed Clean Energy (PACE) programs. According to the request for comment, PACE programs are “financed through special state legislation enabling a ‘super-priority lien’ over existing and subsequent first mortgages.” Because the loans are only recorded in tax rolls and not in land records, they do not show up in title searches. This may potentially cause problems for prospective buyers and mortgage lenders. Additionally, the programs are not uniform across states and the GSEs cannot buy properties encumbered by PACE loans.

    Comments must be received by March 16.

    Agency Rule-Making & Guidance FHFA PACE Programs GSE Consumer Finance State Legislation

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