CEI has fought excessive regulation in the financial sector from laws such as Sarbanes-Oxley and Dodd-Frank. We have scored major bipartisan victories for deregulation. These include the Jumpstart Our Business Startups (JOBS) Act, signed by President Obama in 2012, that lifted or relaxed some of the biggest burdens preventing small and midsize firms from raising capital and going public; and the Economic Growth, Regulatory Relief, and Consumer Protection Act, signed by President Trump in 2018, that lifted some of Dodd-Frank’s crushing burden on community banks and credit unions. We continue to fight to remove regulatory barriers that limit choices and increase costs for entrepreneurs, investors, and consumers.
Banking and Finance Issue Areas
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RealClear Markets
Book Review: Norbert Michel & Jennifer Schulp’s ‘Financing Opportunity’
America is the wealthiest nation on earth, with financial markets that are the envy of the world. Those markets have contributed to America’s rise for…
Blog
House should follow Senate in slashing BBB’s remittance tax–or eliminate it entirely
President Trump has made it clear that he wants a budget reconciliation package on his desk by July 4. In its final version of the…
Daily Calller
Social Security Now Headed For Insolvency Even Sooner Than Expected
Daily Caller cited CEI’s experts on Social Security spending Congress can’t keep dodging entitlement reform. Social Security’s $28 trillion in unfunded liabilities is about the…
Search Posts
The American Spectator
Financial Experts: Dodd-Frank Exacerbates Instability
These were the standout insights from a panel discussion hosted by the Competitive Enterprise Institute (CEI) on April 11. The gathering focused on the Financial…
The American Spectator
Let’s Lose LOST
When Secretary of State John Kerry gave a speech at the Ross Sea Conservation Reception on March 19, he suggested that we should have called…
News Release
Main Street Wins As Dodd-Frank Rules Eased
WASHINGTON, D.C., March 20, 2013 — Today, members of the House Agriculture Committee advanced seven bipartisan bills that would ease derivative rules of the…
Forbes
How To Protect Your Retirement Assets From The Coming Crash
As a chronic prognosticator of doom, I’m often asked, “Do you heed your own warnings?” I sure didn’t the last time the stock market crashed.
Watchdog
Dodd-Frank regulatory flaws stir passion at CPAC
But that’s a point of concern to John Berlau, a financial analyst with the Competitive Enterprise Institute, because this could be taken to mean that…
Blog
Dallas Fed’s Fisher And CPAC’s Fishy Too-Big-To-Fail Event
If the Conservative Political Action Conference’s (CPAC) organizers wanted a speaker or panel on the causes of the financial crisis and what to do about…
New York Times
Letter to the Editor: JOBS Act Successes
Steven Rattner asserts that “the JOBS Act has little to do with employment” (“A Sneaky Way to Deregulate,” Op-Ed, March 4), but the data…
Wall Street Journal
He’s Still a Player
Many musicians have gotten their start in garages and, in the tech era, so have many entrepreneurs. But Herb Alpert has the rare distinction of…
Free Beacon
The Rural Housing Bubble
John Berlau, senior fellow for finance and access to capital at the Competitive Enterprise Institute, agreed. “The government subsidize[s] risky home loans that the private…
Legal Brief
Dodd-Frank State Plaintiffs Opposition to Motion to Dismiss
Eleven states and two private plaintiffs are challenging the constitutionality of the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act. This is the states’ response…
Legal Brief
Dodd-Frank Private Plaintiffs Opposition to Motion to Dismiss
Eleven states and two private plaintiffs are challenging the constitutionality of the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act. This is the private plaintiffs’…
The American Spectator
At Minimum, a Big Loser
President Obama brought the minimum wage debate back into the news in a big way in his State of the Union address, when he proposed…
PJ Media
Here’s to Austerity: Last Day Until Sequestration
Hans Bader of the Competitive Enterprise Institute wrote on February 25 that these cuts are good. The Cato Institute describes why most of these cuts…
Forbes
Sequester This! President Obama’s Colossal Media Blunder
President Obama has gone all-in trying to get Republicans to blink and serve up another round of tax increases in lieu of the looming spending…
National Review
A Genuine Conservative Opinion Editor at the Times
No, not the New York Times. That could happen today only under the most bizarre of circumstances. It’s the Times of London, the Thunderer herself,…
National Review
Countdown to Sequester
The hysteria of President Obama, liberals in Congress, and the media over very small cuts in federal spending from…
Free Beacon
Fannie Motors
“It’s becoming Fannie Motors,” said Competitive Enterprise Institute finance scholar John Berlau, referring to the government-backed housing lender Fannie Mae. “They’re still using our tax…
Free Beacon
A Different Standard
Hans Bader, senior attorney and counsel for special projects at the Competitive Enterprise Institute, which filed a brief in the St. Paul case, said…
Free Beacon
Eight States Join Challenge of Law That Regulates Financial Industry
The move comes more than four months after three other AGs joined the suit, which was originally filed in June by the State National Bank…
Free Beacon
Georgia joins lawsuit challenging Dodd-Frank
In addition to the community bank, original plaintiffs include the Competitive Enterprise Institute and the 60 Plus Association. Attorneys General from Michigan, Oklahoma, and South…
Legal Brief
Dodd-Frank Second Amended Complaint
News Release
Eight More States Join Constitutional Challenge to Dodd-Frank Act
WASHINGTON, D.C., February 13, 2013 – In an attempt to protect their pension funds, taxpayers and financial stability, the states of Alabama, Georgia, Kansas, Montana,…
Free Beacon
Left-Wing Groups Shape Dodd Frank
“That these anti-capitalist agendas are influencing the CFPB is especially troubling, because the CFPB lacks any form of accountability to American voters through Congress,” John…
Letters
Letter to Congress on Nomination of Richard Cordray to the CFPB
CEI and the 60 Plus Association sent a letter urging Congress to take time to consider the re-nomination of Richard Cordray to the CFPB, in…
Free Beacon
Behind the Consumer Confidence Crash
The Competitive Enterprise Institute and the 60 Plus Association are writing Congress “asking the Senate withhold the confirmation of [CFPB director nominee Richard] Cordray until…
Free Beacon
Groups ask Senate to withhold Cordray’s confirmation as CFPB director
The Competitive Enterprise Institute, along with a seniors advocacy group, has sent a letter to Congress asking the Senate to withhold Richard Cordray’s confirmation as…
Free Beacon
Value Destroyers Like Bernanke Fancy Themselves Magician Economists
Economics is not magic. Yet today, many prominent economists insist on pulling off an economic rabbit hat trick when they propose getting something for nothing.
Free Beacon
Plaintiffs from CFPB Suit Urge Cordray Confirmation Delay
The Competitive Enterprise Institute and the 60 Plus Association are urging the Senate to delay confirmation of Richard Cordray, director of the Consumer Financial Protection…
News Release
Spending Cuts Caused Economy to Contract? How About Regulatory Cliff
WASHINGTON, Jan. 30, 2013 — Today, the government reported the stunning news the U.S. economy actually contracted by .1 percent in the fourth quarter…
CBN
If the Economy Is Weak, Why are Stocks Going Up?
Bill Freeza, with the Competitive Enterprise Institute, said he expects a tough economic year. "We're not going to see the kind of growth…
LA Times
Court rules Obama’s recess picks are illegal
"We think it's likely his recess appointment is going to meet the same fate," said Sam Kazman, general counsel of the Competitive Enterprise Institute, a…
Townhall
Dodd-Frank is an Unconstitutional Disaster
That law, Dodd-Frank, is being challenged in State National Bank of Big Spring v. Geithner. The lead plaintiff is a community bank that has had…
Townhall
Not All Austerity Is Equal
Prominent economists, politicians, and pundits throw around the term “austerity” as if policies by…
News Release
Obama’s Financial Nominees Send Mixed Signals
WASHINGTON, D.C., Jan. 24, 2013—Today, President Obama nominated two ex-prosecutors for key financial posts. But John Berlau, senior fellow for finance and access to…
Townhall
Why All The Green Pork In A Deal Meant To Avoid The Fiscal Cliff?
When President Obama’s autopen turned the fiscal cliff deal into law, Americans might have thought that the federal government had begun to walk down the…
Real Clear Politics
Obama Blinks: No Emperor’s New Coin
It looks like the American people have been cheated out of a precious teachable moment. Demonstrating their ability to think two moves ahead, something their…
Real Clear Politics
Something for Everybody (To Hate): Rep. Wilson’s Beach House Bailout
But the bill still has some degree of serious support. In 2007, a version actually passed the House of Representatives 286-155 with co-sponsors that included…
Financial Post
Avoiding the ‘Basel cliff’
John Berlau of the Competitive Enterprise Institute in Washington has called the global bank rules the “Basel cliff” that could decimate many U.S. banks. Banks…
News Release
Eurocrats Delay “Basel III” Albatross on U.S. Banks
WASHINGTON, D.C., January 8, 2013 – Over the weekend, a committee of international regulators and central bankers decided to slightly revise and delay the…
New York Times
Easing of Rules for Banks Acknowledges Reality
“If Basel had been implemented this year as written, it almost certainly would have thrown the U.S. and other economies into a recession more than…
Forbes
Fiscal Justice Trumps Fiscal Sanity, Progressivism Marches On
In his first New Year’s Eve address since taking office, French President François Hollande—progressive poster boy and role model for class warriors the world over—defended his…
Forbes
Happy New Year? Fiscal Cliff, Meet The Costberg
How the largest government on earth plans to expand our liberties in the new year of 2013 by forcing “the rich” to pay somebody’s idea…
News Release
Taxpayers Get Terrible Deal on GM Stock
Washington, D.C. – December 20, 2012 – John Berlau, Senior Fellow for Finance and Access to Capital, had the following to say about the…
CNN
Safety net for business bank accounts at risk
John Berlau, a senior fellow at the Competitive Enterprise Institute, argues ending the TAG program is in the nation's best interest. He said the usefulness…
News Release
TAG Bank Bailout Fails in Senate, Taxpayers Win
Washington, D.C. – December 13, 2012 – On behalf of taxpayers and future generations burdened by the nation’s debt, the Competitive Enterprise Institute rejoices at…
Human Events
The Return of Gunboat Diplomacy
Co-authored with Riley Walters. Last September, China deployed six surveillance ships in response to the Japanese government’s attempt to buy the disputed Senkaku islands,…
Letters
Free-Market Coalition Letter Against TAG’s Unlimited Deposit Insurance
As the Senate prepares today to vote on extending unlimited deposit insurance for non-interest bank accounts, 14 leaders and scholars of conservative and free-market groups signed a…
Huffington Post
Transatlantic Free Trade Must Be Done Right
There's a buzz, says Washington Post columnist David Ignatius, in both Berlin and D.C. these days, for free trade as a potential path back to…
News Release
Coalition Tags TAG Bailout as Regressive and Economically Disastrous
Washington, DC, December 10, 2012 – As the Senate prepares today to vote on extending unlimited deposit insurance for non-interest bank accounts, 14 leaders and scholars…
National Review
Do as Reagan Did, And Free Credit Unions
In their post-mortem on the election, National Review’s editors stressed the need to “make the case that conservative policies would make the broad mass of…
