All Things FinReg

The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) announced a settled action on April 22 with Canadian company RevenueWire (the Company) and its CEO to resolve allegations that the Company assisted and facilitated two tech-support scams that the FTC had previously targeted. Under the alleged scheme, consumers were marketed tech support services to “fix” nonexistent computer problems, leading to hundreds of millions of dollars of consumer injury.

The US Senate approved an additional $310 billion in funds for the Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) on April 20, and the House of Representatives is expected to approve these additional funds within days.

The Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA) and the US Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) announced on March 18 that they have directed Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, the government sponsored enterprises (GSEs), to suspend foreclosures and evictions for at least 60 days due to the coronavirus (COVID-19) national emergency.

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB or Bureau) announced on March 6 three steps designed to advance its strategy on one of its key priorities: preventing consumer harm. The CFPB is (i) implementing an advisory opinion program to provide additional guidance to assist companies in better understanding their legal and regulatory obligations; (ii) amending and reissuing its responsible business conduct bulletin; and (iii) engaging with Congress to advance proposed legislation that would authorize the CFPB to establish a whistleblower program with respect to reporting violations of federal consumer financial law.

At a meeting with a group of state attorneys general in Washington, DC, earlier this week, Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB or Bureau) Director Kathy Kraninger expressed her strong desire to provide more consistent interpretation of statutes and rules enforced by the Bureau and to further work with state counterparts to make that consistency even broader.

A recent legal conference in Washington, DC, highlighted newly proposed and ongoing regulatory changes in California concerning consumer and commercial lending. In short, one of the conference’s messages was that lending enforcement is increasing and the California Department of Business Oversight (DBO) is becoming much more aggressive in its enforcement posture (including with respect to treating retail installment sales contracts and merchant cash-advance products as loans).

On January 30, the five federal financial agencies (Agencies) responsible for the administration of the Volcker Rule—the federal prohibitions on proprietary trading and private fund (covered funds) investments and sponsorship by banking organizations—released a notice of proposed rulemaking (NPR) that, if adopted, would liberalize the ability of US and foreign banking organizations that are subject to the Volcker Rule (banking entities) to sponsor and invest in various additional types of private funds that previously were subject to the Volcker Rule prohibitions.

In an effort to promote compliance and certainty, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB or Bureau) on January 24 issued an often promised and much anticipated policy statement regarding how it intends to apply the “abusiveness” standard in supervision and enforcement matters.

California Governor Gavin Newsom submitted his $222 billion budget proposal for the 2020-2021 fiscal year on January 10. Among other priorities identified, the budget earmarks tens of millions of dollars for the creation and administration of the California Consumer Protection Law (CCPL).

The Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System, the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation, the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, and the US Department of the Treasury’s Financial Crimes Enforcement Network