FRB

Former Fed Chairwoman Janet Yellen joined current Fed Gov. Lael Brainard and former Fed Gov. Jeremy Stein to discuss the impact of the Dodd-Frank Act on the banking and financial services industry over the past 10 years.

Among the top takeaways from the discussion was Yellen’s desire for Congress to create a new Dodd-Frank Act.

Read on for details from their discussion.

Federal financial regulators issued a statement to institutions on managing the transition away from LIBOR, encouraging them to continue work to transition to alternative reference rates.

The statement from the Federal Financial Institutions Examination Council also highlighted the legal and consumer compliance risks associated with inadequate fallback language, when the contractual language does not contemplate LIBOR’s permanent discontinuance.

Read on for more details from the agencies’ statement.

The Federal Reserve announced that all 34 of the banks which it put through stress tests had passed, but said the banks would be required to submit new capital plans later in the year to address stresses related to the pandemic.

In addition to its regular stress test, the Fed used downside scenarios which could result from the pandemic, and found that in two of the three scenarios, several banks would approach minimum capital levels.

Read on for more details from the results, as well as reaction from Moody’s Analytics and the American Bankers Association.

A day after opening lender registration to the Federal Reserve’s Main Street Lending Facility, Chairman Jerome Powell talked with the Senate Banking Committee about the timing for the full launch of the facility.

In addition, the Fed announced that it would resume examinations for all covered institutions.

Read on for details from the chairman’s appearance and other Fed announcements.

The Federal Reserve announced another change to its still-stalled Main Street Lending facility.

Responding to concerns that the facility was still priced above the lending capacity of most Main Street businesses, the Fed’s latest move dropped the minimum loan amount to $250,000 from $500,000, among other changes.

Read on for details from the announcement, and just when the facility might be launching.

Looking to provide a path forward for lenders considering small-dollar products to offer consumers, federal financial regulators recently issued principles for conducting small-dollar lending.

The principles were released by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp., the Federal Reserve, the National Credit Union Administration and the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency.

Read on for details from the agencies’ statement and principles.

Federal financial regulators met virtually with the Senate Banking Committee on May 12 to discuss the Paycheck Protection Program (PPP), the Community Reinvestment Act, and the state of their institutions.

The hearing featured representatives from the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp., Federal Reserve, the National Credit Union Administration and the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency.

Read on for details from the hearing, including regulators’ fair lending expectations from PPP lenders.

Federal Reserve Chairman Jay Powell talked via webcast with the Peterson Institute for International Economics on May 13, updating the state of the economy today.

His focus was on the burden which has fallen “most heavily” on those who are least able to bear it.

Read on for details from the report, including highlights from a supplemental survey the Fed conducted on the state of the economy.

In its annual report released this month, the Federal Reserve announced that it is responding to its supervisory work in new ways during the pandemic.

The Fed said that in many ways, the short-term supervisory response to the containment measures echoes the response to a natural disaster, such as a hurricane or flood, except that the response has been nationwide.

Read on for more details about how the Fed expects to supervise large and small organizations for the rest of the year.

Importantly, though, by making the changes to the program, the Fed is asking lenders making the loans to bear more risk.

Read on for details of the Fed’s new options, and how much of the risk the regulator is requiring lenders to bear.