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The Many Harms of Unlimited Deposit Insurance
Unlimited deposit insurance – the government guaranteeing that bank accounts of any size be made whole-in the event of a bank failure – would create…
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The Risks of Bailing Out Silicon Valley Bank’s Uninsured Depositors and How to Make the Banking System Resilient
On Sunday evening, the Biden administration decided that all customers of the failed Silicon Valley Bank will have their millions and possibly billions in the…
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Fed Economist: Study Shows Danger of Government-Mandated Financial Misinformation
Study from Fed Economist Shows Danger of Government-Mandated Financial Misinformation The “Twitter Files” have made some shocking revelations about government entities…
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Study from Fed Economist Shows Danger of Government-Mandated Financial Misinformation
The “Twitter Files” have made some shocking revelations about government entities muscling social media companies to deplatform people in the name of preventing so-called…
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Hearing Shows Bipartisan Momentum for Focused Financial Deregulation
Last week, I had the honor and pleasure of testifying at the first hearing of the newly constituted Financial Institutions and Monetary Policy subcommittee…
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Berlau Crypto Letter and Comments in Wall Street Journal and Washington Examiner
This week, I have had the honor of being quoted in a great article on cryptocurrency trends and regulation in the Washington Examiner and having…
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The Deregulatory Pony for Small Biz Buried in the Omnibus Pile
There’s not much good to say about an “omnibus” bill crammed in at the end-of-year lame duck session of Congress that contains a grab bag…
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FTX Hearings Should Probe Fraud Charges and the SEC’s Misplaced Priorities
In the wake of the arrest of and charges of fraud against Sam Bankman-Fried, the disgraced founder and former CEO of the FTX…
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Why Choke Point Should Bar Gruenberg from Being FDIC Chair
Tomorrow morning, the Senate Banking Committee will hold a hearing on President Biden’s nomination of Marty Gruenberg to once again serve as Chair of the…
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Gensler Fiddled with ESG and Power Grabs while FTX Burned
When asked on CNBC about the implosion of crypto exchange FTX, Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) Chairman Gary Gensler turned the focus away from the…
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Reining in Biden CFPB’s “Junk” Policies with Fifth Circuit Ruling
When the federal Fifth Circuit Court Appeals ruled last week, in Community Financial Services v. Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, that the funding structure of…
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Excerpts from Austin Keynote: How CBDCs Could Be the New Operation Choke Point
This week, I attended the exciting INFiN MoneyTrends conference in Austin, where I gave the Regulatory Keynote address on Monday. The conference is a…
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FTC Goes Back to Bad ‘70s Policies in Motor Vehicle Dealer Rule
Last night at CEI’s annual Julian L. Simon Memorial Award Dinner, CEI celebrated the 1970s—both the fashions and the deregulation toward the end of the…
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Paternalistic FTC Rule Would Stifle Consumer Choice in Auto Market
As if American drivers didn’t face enough headwinds with high gas prices, supply chain constraints, and state rules that may force them out of…
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Prominent Short Sellers Target ESG-themed Firms
For a long while, my CEI colleagues and I have touted the vital role that short sellers play in a free market economy. CEI Founder…
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Why Carried Interest Tax Hike Deserves to Die in IRA and Otherwise
The Inflation Reduction Act (referred to by critics such as Phil Kerpen as the Income Reduction Act) will likely be voted on in the…
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Defeat of Pot Banking Liberalization Will Lead to More Violent Crime and Reduced U.S. Competitiveness
It is beyond disappointing that Congress once again dropped the Secure and Fair Enforcement (SAFE) Banking Act—bipartisan legislation that would prevent the federal government from…
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Crypto Volatility Heightens with Panic-Driven Regulation
In reaction to the volatile events of the last few weeks, both the stock and cryptocurrency markets have taken a deep dive. While this downturn…
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George Washington, George Jarkesy, and the Administrative State’s Lack of Fundamental Justice
The recent ruling by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit in Jarkesy v. SEC is a victory for limited constitutional government…
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Credit Union Liberalization Bill Clears Away Never-Needed Red Tape
When I testified last July at a high-profile hearing on financial inclusion, I urged members of the House Financial Services Committee to liberalize regulations…
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CEI Joins Groups in Telling SEC to Stay Away from Private Markets
It’s bad enough that Congress and the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) have made it so costly for smaller companies to go and stay public…
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Lisa Cook’s First Amendment Problem Should Concern Senators
As early as Tuesday, the U.S. Senate could vote on the nomination of Lisa Cook to be a governor of the Federal Reserve, along with…
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My Response to the CFPB’s “Junky” Regulatory Inquiry on Fees
In response to the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau’s (CFPB) “request for information” on what its Director Rohit Chopra has labeled as “junk fees” on financial…
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Celebrate Decade of JOBS Act as Deregulatory Success
10 years ago, a GOP-controlled House, a Democrat-controlled Senate, and a Democratic president came together to lighten the regulatory burden on America’s upstart job creators.
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Why Cannabis Banking Liberalization Would Indeed Increase U.S. Competitiveness
As war continues in the aftermath of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, interest by policy makers and the media has spiked in competitiveness bills passed separately…
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George Washington, Larry David, Cryptocurrency, and Freedom
One of the most talked-about Super Bowl ads was that of Larry David traveling through history and naysaying innovations that turned out to be hugely…
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Lisa Cook’s First Amendment Problem
Today, the Senate Banking Committee is set to vote on five nominations for the Federal Reserve Board. My CEI colleague Myron Ebell and I have…
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New Mexico Should Reject Interest Rate Limit Base on Federal Mismeasurement
There is an old saying that “a lie can travel halfway around the world while the truth is still putting on its shoes.” It has…
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CFPB’s Dodd-Frank Race and Gender Data Collection Mandates Will Harm Financial Inclusion
In mid-2020, on the 10th anniversary of the Dodd-Frank financial overhaul being rammed through Congress and signed by then-President Obama, I catalogued the damage…
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Lenny Bruce, Capitalism vs. Communism, and Biden’s Banking Nominee
At the height of the Cold War in the 1960s, then-controversial comedian Lenny Bruce offered a surprising boost to the defense of capitalism over communism.