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Not unlike her first stint in the congressional hot seat as director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB), Kathy Kraninger addressed changes to the bureau’s approach to enforcement and fulfilling its statutory mission during her second semi-annual report to Congress.

Multiple congressional representatives, including a former enforcement officer, picked apart Kraninger’s method for determining appropriate amounts for fines and restitution included in settlement agreements.

Learn what insights came out of the hearings. 

The first report from Consumer Financial Protection Bureau Private Education Loan Ombudsman Robert Cameron found that over the past two years, two-thirds of the complaints the agency received regarding student loans were on federal student loans, rather than private loans.

Cameron offered up recommendations in the report regarding complaints and unscrupulous student loan debt relief companies, suggesting that all policymakers should consider working together more closely.

Read on for more insights from the bureau’s report.

Financial industry advocates noted their concerns about draft legislation on third-party vendor authority with regard to third-party cloud storage providers in letters to House leaders.

The draft legislation proposes to amend the Bank Service Company Act to cover vendors of credit unions and entities supervised by the Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA) to the same extent as it covers banks and savings associations.

Find out what financial trade associations had to say about the proposed measure.

A new taskforce is being commissioned by the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) to examine potentially viable avenues for improving and strengthening existing federal consumer financial laws and regulations.

The bureau is taking applications to join its Taskforce on Federal Consumer Financial Law, which will have a similar mission to a national commission established in 1968.

Learn more about the taskforce and its membership qualifications.

As the constitutionality question looms seemingly larger than ever over the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB), financial industry advocates largely have maintained their long-held contention that the best remedy for the bureau’s controversial leadership structure is to reform it as a bipartisan commission.

The Consumer Bankers Association noted that such a structure was proposed in the original version of Dodd-Frank that passed the House with bipartisan support in 2010.

Find out what specific points the trade organization cited.

The increasing popularity of alternative and innovative means for verifying mortgage borrowers’ ability to repay their loans has caused financial entities and regulators to reevaluate rules and statutes implemented to protect those same borrowers from the types of predatory lending that contributed to the financial crisis.

Many reason that some of the safeguards put in place by the Dodd-Frank Act and federal regulators are too restrictive and offered various suggestions for addressing that issue.

Find out more details about stakeholder suggestions.

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) issued a rule finalizing specific provisions of the agency’s May 2019 Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (NPRM) under the Home Mortgage Disclosure Act (HMDA) regarding data collection requirements for small entities.

The rule also provides clarity regarding the applicability of partial HMDA exemption provisions not covered in previous rulemakings – namely with regard to mergers and acquisitions.

Learn more details about how the rule will impact the financial industry. 

For the third time this year, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau announced it has taken action against defendants involved in alleged unfair or deceptive acts or practices in offering high-interest credit to veterans and other consumers.

The circumstances of the most recent lawsuit, filed in a South Carolina district court, are strikingly similar to the two other cases against brokers whom were found to have direct business ties.

Learn more details about the similarities between the past cases and the most recent one.

Consumer Financial Protection Bureau Director Kathy Kraninger recently announced the appointment of members to the Consumer Advisory Board, as well as the bureau’s three discretionary advisory committees – the Community Bank Advisory Council, the Credit Union Advisory Council and the Academic Research Council.

Per the planned enhancements Kraninger announced in March, the committees’ focus will shift to broad policy matters and the frequency of in-person meetings, along with a host of other changes.

Get more details about the new committee members and changes to their terms and duties.

Wells Fargo’s search for a new CEO ended with the announcement that Charles Scharf has been hired to succeed Tim Sloan in the role. Per settlements with federal regulators, Wells Fargo was required to receive approval from the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC) before its new CEO hiring could become official.

Scharf said that one of his top priorities as CEO is to “make sure we get the regulatory issues behind us,” and that he is grateful for the opportunity to lead the company as it continues to transform.

Find out more details about his appointment.