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Financial Agencies Issue Advisory Addressing Appraiser Availability
On May 31, the FDIC, the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve, the OCC, and the NCUA issued FIL-19-2017 to discuss two possible methods for addressing appraiser shortages: (i) temporary practice permits and (ii) temporary waivers. The resulting Interagency Advisory addresses concerns raised pursuant to the Economic Growth and Regulatory Paperwork Reduction Act process regarding the shortage of certified and licensed appraisers, particularly in rural areas. The advisory states that “[t]emporary practice permits could allow state certified or licensed appraisers to provide their services in states where they are not certified or licensed, including those experiencing a shortage of appraisers.” The advisory further states that temporary waivers may also be granted thus improving the timeliness of appraisals in those areas. The advisory applies to all FDIC-supervised institutions.
CFPB Closes Public Comments on Remittance Transfer Rule; Industry Groups Submit Responses
As previously covered in InfoBytes, the CFPB issued a request for comment on its plan for assessing the effectiveness of its May 2013 final rule governing consumer remittance transfers (Remittance Rule). The request, which closed for public comment on May 23, focused on, among other things: (i) “whether the market for remittances has evolved . . . in ways that promote access, efficiency, and limited market disruption”; and (ii) whether the Remittance Rule (and other CFPB regulatory activity) has “brought more information, transparency, and greater predictability of prices to the market.” The CFPB received over 35 public comments from a vast array of large and small credit unions, as well as some of the leading providers of money transfer by volume. The consensus among these institutions was that implementing and maintaining the Remittance Rule’s new disclosures, cancellation windows, and audits are costly and the benefits to consumers are negligible. Specifically, one commenter noted increased consumer confusion, increased consumer delays in receiving their funds, and some have discontinued offering money transfers altogether.
On May 23, the American Bankers Association (ABA) submitted a comment letter calling upon the Bureau to conduct an evidence-based assessment on whether the rule has preserved consumers’ access to remittance services. According to a survey conducted by the ABA of 75 member banks of varying asset sizes and cited in the comment letter, the rule—intended to “provide additional information to help consumers shop for remittances and establish error resolution procedures and protections”—has “restricted consumers’ access to remittances, increased fees for use of the service, and unnecessarily delayed remittance requests.” As explained in the letter, the ABA expressed concern about the rule, stating that there is “little evidence that the final rule has improved consumer decision-making or facilitated comparison shopping.” Furthermore, the ABA has asked the CFPB to examine the following issues: (i) whether consumers, including those in rural areas, have access to remittance transfer services; (ii) whether consumers are provided information about remittance services that inform rather than confuse; and (iii) whether regulation of remittances is not unnecessarily burdensome to the financial institutions that provide this service.
Separately, on May 23, The Clearing House, the Consumer Bankers Association, the Bankers Association for Finance and Trade, and the ABA (Associations), issued a joint letter urging the CFPB to examine the effects of the rule from the perspective of both consumer-senders of remittance transfers and the providers of those services. The Associations outlined recommendations for the CFPB including: (i) continuing to permit depository institutions to provide estimates of third-party fees and exchange rates rather than actual fees and rates in cases where obtaining exact data is not feasible; (ii) excluding from the rule high-value transfers in excess of a certain dollar amount as well as excluding from coverage transfers effectuated through reloadable prepaid cards; (iii) modifying disclosure requirements and cancellation and resend rights; and (iv) making changes to the rule’s error resolution provisions to hold the sender responsible for transaction costs resulting from sender error.Department of Education Releases Phase II Amending the Federal Student Loan Servicing Solicitation
On May 19, the U.S. Department of Education (Department) announced the formal amendment of Phase II of the federal student loan servicing solicitation. According to a fact sheet issued by the Department, the amendment outlines plans to select a single student loan servicer that all borrowers will interact with on a unified platform. This is a departure from the current system in which nine servicing companies handle borrowers’ payments of their federal student loans. The amendment further clarifies and lists the Department's expectations of the eventual servicer. U.S. Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos commented on the announcement, “[w]ith changes in the new amendment, we have simplified the process to ensure meaningful borrower protections while saving taxpayers more than $130 million over the next five years. Savings are expected to increase significantly over the life of the contract. Borrowers can expect to see a more user-friendly loan servicing interface, shorter email and call response times and an improved payment application method that will maximize the benefit of each payment the borrower makes. Our amendment makes no changes to repayment plan requirements.”
As previously covered in InfoBytes, DeVos also rolled back Obama administration policies developed to guide the way in which the federal government contracts with outside servicers.
South Carolina Governor Amends Mortgage Lender, Broker Licensing Requirements
On May 19, South Carolina Governor Henry McMaster signed into law amendments (S 366) to the state’s Mortgage Lending Act, Mortgage Broker Act, and related laws to revise a variety of mortgage lending definitions, licensing procedures and requirements, and disclosure obligations. The legislation also adds license requirements for mortgage lenders who act as mortgage brokers on the majority of their mortgage loans. The amendments take effect September 16, 2017.
Former Mining Company Management Group Consultant Sentenced to Two Years in Prison
On May 31, the son of a former Prime Minister of Gabon, a former consultant to a joint venture between a mining company management group and an entity incorporated in the Turks and Caicos, was sentenced to two years in prison for conspiring to violate the FCPA by bribing government officials in several African countries.
As previously reported here, the former consultant previously pleaded guilty to allegations related to payments of approximately $3 million to high-level government officials in Niger, in addition to providing luxury cars, in order to obtain uranium mining concessions. Similarly, the DOJ charged him with bribing a high-ranking government official in Chad with luxury foreign travel to obtain a uranium mining concession there, and with bribing government officials in Guinea with cash, the use of private jets, and a luxury car in order to obtain confidential government information. Prior Scorecard coverage regarding the mining company management group is here.
House to Consider Financial CHOICE Act of 2017 the Week of June 5
On May 26, the House announced that the Financial CHOICE Act of 2017 is scheduled to hit the House floor the week of June 5. House Financial Services Committee Chairman, Jeb Hensarling (R-Tex.), drafted a Substitute Amendment and a corresponding summary of changes, which clarify that “rules promulgated under provisions of law repealed by H.R. 10 are no longer in effect.” Notably Hensarling agreed to strike Section 735, which would repeal the Durbin Amendment from the second discussion draft of the Act. The Durbin Amendment—an amendment to the EFTA added by section 1075 of the Dodd-Frank Act—requires the Federal Reserve Board to cap interchange fees that banks with assets of $10 billion or more may receive from payment card networks in debt card transactions. The decision to strike the Durbin Amendment happened despite bank support for the repeal.
Changes to the bill also include the following, among others: (i) Section 341 will be amended to clarify that “gaps or ambiguities found by a reviewing court in a statutory or regulatory provision are not to be construed as a delegation of rule-making authority to an agency, and that a reviewing court is not to use such a gap or ambiguity as grounds for expansively interpreting the agency’s authority or deferring to the agency’s interpretation of law;” and (ii) Section 571’s amendment will suspend HMDA data reporting requirements until January 1, 2019. Looking ahead, the House Rules Committee set a June 2 deadline for lawmakers to file amendments.
Texas Enacts Law Expanding Requirements for Holders of Debt Cancellation Agreements
On May 26, Texas Governor Greg Abbott signed into law SB 1052, which contains provisions related to retail installment contracts and debt cancellation agreements in the state. Notably, the revised and renumbered Section 354.007 of the Finance Code, “Refund for Debt Cancellation Agreements,” concerns the responsibilities of the holder or the administrator of the agreement. This section has been amended to add that if a debt cancellation occurs as a result of an early termination of the contract, the holder shall, within 60 days of the termination, “refund or credit an appropriate amount of the debt cancellation agreement fee” or refund or credit the appropriate amount of the fee through written instructions to the appropriate person. Revisions also dictate that the holder will ensure that the refund or credit of the debt cancellation agreement fee “made by another person” is also made no later than 60 days after the agreement terminates. Furthermore, the holder is now responsible for maintaining records pertaining to the refund or credit of the debt cancellation agreement fee, and likewise, must grant electronic access to the records per the terms of the provision. The law takes effect September 1, 2017.
Payday Lenders Argue Case for Operation Choke Point Injunction, Claim Regulator Activities Violate Their Rights to Due Process
On May 19, a group of payday lenders filed a brief with the Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia claiming a U.S. district court judge was wrong to deny their request for a preliminary injunction against regulator activities they claim violate their rights to due process. (See Advance America v. FDIC, et al, 2017 WL 2212168 (C.A.D.C.).) As previously discussed in InfoBytes, the lenders claim the DOJ’s “Operation Choke Point” initiative—designed to target fraud by investigating U.S. banks and the business they do with companies believed to be a higher risk for fraud and money laundering—is a threat to their survival. The lenders’ brief alleges that federal agencies, including the DOJ and the FDIC, began as early as June 2008 to expand the interpretation of “reputation risk.” According to the lenders, reputation risk originally referred to risk to a bank’s reputation that arose from its own actions; however, the regulators expanded that to apply to risks that could arise from activities of a bank’s customers, which meant “bank servicing businesses identified as ‘high risk’ would be required to incur significant additional regulatory compliance costs and face the risk of increased regulatory scrutiny.” This, the lenders assert, became a justification to pressure banks to sever their banking relationships with payday lenders.
Notably, the U.S. district court judge refused to issue a preliminary injunction and was not persuaded that the lenders would be able to prove that these regulatory actions caused banks to deny services the lenders needed to operate.
However, the lenders claim in their brief that they can show a violation of their procedural due process rights under three theories: “stigma-plus,” “reputation-plus,” and “broad preclusion.”
- The lenders describe the “stigma-plus” theory as requiring them to show they were stigmatized in connection with an “alteration of their background legal rights” without any due process protections. They believe they can prove this occurred because they were labeled as high-risk customers and denied access to the banking system with no legal protections.
- The “reputation-plus” theory would require a deprivation of banking services in connection with defamatory statements that harmed their reputation, the lenders claim. The lenders contend this can be proved because the “’stigmatizing charges certainly occurred in the course of the termination of the accounts, which is all that is required for a reputation-plus claim to succeed.” Each lender claims to have lost a relationship with at least one bank due to false regulator claims that the relationships could threaten the bank’s stability.
- The “broad preclusion” theory also applies, the lenders assert, because the regulators’ statements to banks have prevented them “pursuing their chosen line of business.”
Furthermore, the lenders take issue with the U.S. district court judge’s position that they are required to show they lost all access to banking services in order to show a due process violation. They also argue that a loss of their constitutional right to due process is a sufficient irreparable injury to justify a preliminary injunction.
President Trump Releases 2018 Budget Proposal; Key Areas of Reform Target Financial Regulators, Cybersecurity, and Student Loans
On May 23, the White House released its fiscal 2018 budget request, A New Foundation for American Greatness, along with Major Savings and Reforms, which set forth the President’s funding proposals and priorities. The mission of the President’s budget is to bring spending under control by proposing savings of $57.3 billion in discretionary programs, including $26.7 billion in program eliminations and $30.6 billion in reductions.
Financial Regulators. The budget stresses the importance of reducing the cost of complying with “burdensome financial regulations” adopted by independent agencies under the Dodd-Frank Act. However, the proposal provides few details about how the reform applies to federal financial services regulators. Identifying the CFPB specifically, the budget states that restructuring the Bureau is necessary in order to “ensure appropriate congressional oversight and to refocus [the] CFPB’s efforts on enforcing the law rather than impeding free commerce.” Major Savings and Reforms assert that subjecting the Bureau to the congressional appropriations process would “impose financial discipline and prevent future overreach of the Agency into consumer advocacy and activism.” The budget projects further savings of $35 billion through the end of 2027, resulting from legal, regulatory, and policy changes to be recommended by the Treasury once it completes its effectiveness review of existing laws and regulations in collaboration with the Financial Stability Oversight Council. The Treasury review is being performed as a result of the Executive Order on Core Principals.
Dept. of Housing and Urban Development. As previously reported in InfoBytes, the budget proposes that funding be eliminated for the following: (i) small grant programs such as the Self-Help Homeownership Opportunity Program, which includes, among others, the Capacity Building for Community Development and Affordable Housing Program (a savings of $56 million); (ii) the CHOICE Neighborhoods program (a savings of $125 million), stating state and local governments should fund strategies for neighborhood revitalization; (iii) the Community Development Block Grant (a savings of $2.9 billion), over claims that it “has not demonstrated results”; and (iv) the HOME Investment Partnerships Programs (a savings of $948 million). The budget also proposes reductions to the Native American Housing Block Grant and plans to reduce costs across HUD’s rental assistance programs through legislative reforms. Rental assistance programs generally comprise about 80 percent of HUD’s total funding.
Cybersecurity. The budget states that it “supports the President’s focus on cybersecurity to ensure strong programs and technology to defend the Federal networks that serve the American people, and continues efforts to share information, standards, and best practices with critical infrastructure and American businesses to keep them secure.” Law enforcement and cybersecurity personnel across the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), Department of Defense, and the FBI will see budget increases to execute efforts to counter cybercrime. Furthermore, the National Cybersecurity and Communications Integration Center—which DHS uses to respond to infrastructure cyberattacks—will receive an increase under the budget.
Student Loan Reform. Under the proposed budget, a single income driven repayment plan (IDR) would be created that caps monthly payments at 12.5 percent of discretionary income—an increase from the 10 percent cap some current payment plans offer. Furthermore, balances would be forgiven after a specific number of repayment years—15 for undergraduate debt, 30 for graduate. In doing so, the Public Service Loan Forgiveness program and subsidized loans will be eliminated, and reforms will be established to “guarantee that borrowers in IDR pay an equitable share of their income.” These proposals will only apply to loans originated on or after July 1, 2018, with the exception of loans provided to borrowers in order to finish their “current course of study.”
Dept. of the Treasury. The budget proposes to, among other things: (i) eliminate funding for new Community Development Financial Institutions Fund grants (a savings of $220 million); and (ii) reduce funding for the Troubled Asset Relief Program by 50 percent, “commensurate with the wind-down of TARP programs” (a savings of $21 million).
Response from Treasury. In a statement released by the Treasury, Secretary Steven T. Mnuchin said the budget “prioritizes investments in cybersecurity, and maintains critical funding to implement sanctions, combat terrorist financing, and protect financial institutions from threats.” Furthermore, it also would “achieve savings through reforms that prevent taxpayer bailouts and reverse burdensome regulations that have been harmful to small businesses and American workers.”
Fannie, Freddie to Allow Electronically Recorded Mortgage Copies
On May 10, Fannie Mae announced it would begin accepting copies of electronically recorded mortgages rather than original wet-signed documents. This follows a prior September 2016 announcement from Freddie Mac, which changed its policy on the electronic recording of paper closing documents.
Fannie Mae. As set forth in Section A2-5.2-01 of its Servicing Guide, Fannie Mae says that electronic records may be delivered and retained as part of an electronic transaction by the seller/servicer to the servicer, document custodian or Fannie Mae, or by a third party, as long as the methods are compatible with all involved parties. Additionally, the electronic records must be in compliance with the requirements and standards set forth in ESIGN and, when applicable, the Uniform Electronic Transactions Act, as “adopted by the state in which the subject property secures by the mortgage loan associated with the electronic record is located.”
Freddie Mac. A bulletin released last September updated Sections 1401.14 and 15 of Freddie Mac’s Servicing Guide by removing the requirement that a seller/servicer retain the original paper security instrument signed by the borrower if an electronic copy of the original security instrument is electronically recorded at the recorder’s office, provided the following conditions are met:
- The seller securely stores along with the other eMortgage documents either (i) “the electronically recorded copy of the original security instrument,” or (ii) “the recorder’s office other form of recording confirmation with the recording information thereon”; and
- Storage of the original security instrument signed by the borrower is not required by applicable law.
According to Freddie Mac, “Removing this requirement addresses one of the barriers for eMortgage adoption in the industry, permitting more [m]ortgage file documents to be [e]lectronic and reducing some storage costs for [s]eller/[s]ervicers.”