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Jeffrey P. Naimon quoted in American Banker article, “Why Kraninger's CFPB is mandating fewer consumer refunds”

American Banker

Jeffrey P. Naimon was quoted on February 20, 2019 in an American Banker article, “Why Kraninger's CFPB is mandating fewer consumer refunds,” which discussed how the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau appears to be shifting away from requiring financial institutions to refund customers in response to enforcement actions. The article stated, “The trend away from refunding consumers may reflect a turnabout at the agency under Republican leadership — total enforcement actions, for instance, are down 70% in the past year. Under former Director Richard Cordray, the CFPB returned $12 billion to consumers over six years, some of which came in the form of canceled consumer debts.

Naimon noted, “It’s very natural for there to be a pullback" in relief because under Cordray "a lot of the theories were very aggressive in the past and this is a normalization.”

The article further reported that some lawyers feel that recent communications from lawmakers to the CFPB requesting all communications, including draft consent orders, between the bureau and companies involved in recent settlements could have a chilling effect on what companies disclose to the bureau in the future. Naimon explained, “The idea that confidential company information could be released to Congress sets a bad precedent and will make it harder for the CFPB to bring enforcement actions. This will make communicating more difficult because it is more fraught if your audience isn’t the enforcement staff at the CFPB but is the public.”

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