Financial Regulation

• By: Daniel Press
• 04/29/2019

Will reforming consumer finance regulation cause a recession? That is the claim of a recent article in The Hill. Yet, the article provides little evidence to…

Banking and Finance

• By: Daniel Press
• 04/23/2019

Today, the Competitive Enterprise Institute led a coalition of eighteen free market organizations in support of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau’s decision to rescind portions of…

Banking and Finance

• By: Daniel Press
• 04/18/2019

Earlier this week, The New York Times Magazine rolled out another edition of the tired old trope of how former acting Director Mick Mulvaney “destroyed”…

Banking and Finance

• By: John Berlau
• 04/16/2019

A few days ago, the Trump administration issued a memorandum strongly discouraging what the Competitive Enterprise Institute’s Wayne Crews has called “regulatory dark matter.” The…

Banking and Finance

• By: Daniel Press
• 04/12/2019

In a market economy that is based on private property and the rule of law, the efficient and effective enforcement of contracts is indispensable. Without…

Banking and Finance

• By: John Berlau
• 03/29/2019

After much anticipation, Lyft finally went public today, opening on NASDAQ at $87.24 per share—well above its initial public offering price of $72. Lyft’s market…

Banking and Finance

• By: Daniel Press
• 03/28/2019

As my colleague Devin Watkins discussed earlier this month, a number of federal administrative agencies are refusing to correctly implement a crucial piece of regulatory…

Banking and Finance

• By: Devin Watkins
• 03/12/2019

The Dodd-Frank Act of 2010 is one of the worst pieces of legislation to have become law in recent history. It created the Consumer Financial…

Banking and Finance

• By: Daniel Press
• 02/26/2019

Everyone understands the need for access to credit. No matter how well we budget, we occasionally come up short due to an unexpected circumstance or expense—a…

Banking and Finance

• By: John Berlau
• 02/15/2019

There are many types of burdensome government mandates, but of all the Ten Thousand Commandments, regulations that coerce the purchase of a particular product or…

Banking and Finance

• By: Daniel Press
• 02/12/2019

The comment period on a critical new initiative to promote innovation in financial services from the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau closed this Monday. My colleague…

Banking and Finance

• By: Daniel Press, John Berlau
• 02/12/2019

On behalf of the Competitive Enterprise Institute (“CEI"), we are pleased to provide the following comment letter on the Bureau of Consumer Financial Protection’s (“Bureau,”…

Banking and Finance

• By: Daniel Press
• 02/12/2019

Chalk up another win for President Trump’s deregulatory agenda - the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau last week announced a plan to reconsider an Obama-era regulation…

Banking and Finance

• By: Richard Morrison
• 02/07/2019

Our friends at the Federalist Society have an interesting new video out on legal businesses being targeted for government harassment because their products have become politically…

Banking and Finance

• By: Michelle Minton
• 02/04/2019

For the first time since 1992, Americans outside of Nevada can legally wager on the outcome of the Super Bowl. This comes thanks to a recent…

Banking and Finance

• By: Daniel Press
• 02/04/2019

While the 115th Congress did not achieve all that was hoped for with regards to financial services reform, it did make important progress to achieving…

Banking and Finance

• By: John Berlau
• 01/31/2019

In a major speech to a liberal group outlining her priorities as chairman of the House Financial Services Committee, Rep. Maxine Waters (D-CA) sharply criticized…

Banking and Finance

• By: Michelle Minton
• 01/24/2019

Daily Mail cited Senior Fellow Michelle Minton on online gambling: But Michelle Minton, a senior fellow at the Competitive Enterprise Institute, said the…

Banking and Finance

• Michelle Minton
• 01/15/2019

In an effort to strike at online gambling, the Department of Justice Office of Legal Counsel this week issued a new opinion that will allow…

Banking and Finance

• By: Michelle Minton
• 01/11/2019

Reason cited research by Senior Fellow Michelle Minton on state gambling regulations and the Department of Justice. Research into a history of the Wire…

Financial Regulation

• By: John Berlau
• 01/09/2019

As cryptocurrency and the associated blockchain celebrate their tenth birthdays, CEI’s new “Free to Prosper” agenda for the 116th Congress aims to ensure bureaucratic red…

Banking and Finance

• By: Daniel Press
• 01/04/2019

2018 was a big year for the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (also known, for a while, as the Bureau of Consumer Financial Protection). The past year…

Banking and Finance

• By: Sam Kazman
• 12/27/2018

This April, something remarkable happened in Washington D.C. The acting head of a federal agency told Congress that the agency he directs “is far too…

Banking and Finance

• By: John Berlau
• 12/19/2018

Every Halloween, there exists the temptation for commentators to describe routine events in the news with adjectives like “scary” and “frightening.” Sensitive to sounding clichéd…

Banking and Finance

• By: Daniel Press
• 12/07/2018

Kathleen Kraninger was confirmed as director of the Bureau of Consumer Financial Protection. She has promised to implement a free market reform agenda, focusing on…

Banking and Finance

• John Berlau
• 12/06/2018

Competitive Enterprise Institute Senior Fellow John Berlau praised today’s Senate confirmation of President Trump’s nominee to head the powerful Bureau of Consumer Financial Protection (BCFP)…

Banking and Finance

• By: Daniel Press
• 12/05/2018

While President Trump’s nominee to head the Bureau of Consumer Financial Protection, Kathleen Kraninger, awaits a final confirmation vote in the Senate, Senate Democrats have…

Banking and Finance

• By: Daniel Press, John Berlau
• 11/29/2018

IA InsideARM cited CEI’s Senior Fellow John Berlau and Policy Analyst Daniel Press on BCFP nominee Kathleen Kraninger. As insideARM reported earlier,…

Financial Regulation

• By: John Berlau
• 11/09/2018

Next year, with Congress divided once again, bipartisan legislation will be the order of the day. Indeed for passage of both chambers, it will be…

Banking and Finance

• By: Daniel Press
• 11/08/2018

Last week, I wrote a blog post on how the Bureau of Consumer Financial Protection could go about narrowly rewriting the payday loan rule. This would…

Banking and Finance

• By: Daniel Press
• 10/29/2018

Last Friday, the Bureau of Consumer Financial Protection announced that it will be reconsidering its’ controversial Payday, Vehicle Title, and High-Cost Installment Loan rule.

Banking and Finance

• By: Daniel Press
• 10/10/2018

July 31st, 2018, was one of the most exciting days for financial technology regulation in recent memory. Around 10 a.m. that morning was when the…

Banking and Finance

• By: Michelle Minton
• 09/27/2018

Chairman Sensenbrenner, Ranking Member Jackson Lee and Members of the Subcommittee, thank you for the opportunity to present comments on behalf of my organization, the…

Financial Regulation

• By: Daniel Press
• 09/21/2018

Ten years ago this month marks the anniversary of one of the most dramatic events of the 2008 financial crisis: the collapse of Lehman Brothers,…

Banking and Finance

• By: Michelle Minton
• 09/20/2018

For the first time in twenty-five years, Americans can legally wager on the outcome of sporting events outside of Nevada. Thanks to a Supreme…

Banking and Finance

• By: Daniel Press
• 09/14/2018

Ten years ago, the United States plunged into a financial crisis that would bring the world economy to the brink of collapse. The housing bubble…

Banking and Finance

• By: Daniel Press
• 09/07/2018

On Wednesday, a coalition of fourteen Democratic attorneys generals wrote a letter to the Bureau of Consumer Financial Protection urging the acting director, Mick…

Banking and Finance

• By: John Berlau
• 09/07/2018

Today, the Competitive Enterprise Institute is asking the Supreme Court to hear the lawsuit we filed challenging the constitutionality of the Bureau of Consumer Financial…

Banking and Finance

• By: Daniel Press
• 08/31/2018

Great news for middle-class investors and start-up businesses alike—on Thursday, the Securities and Exchange Commission Chairman Jay Clayton announced that the SEC is looking…

Banking and Finance

• By: John Berlau
• 08/27/2018

With the increasing focus on inequality and cronyism on both Left and Right, one would think that politicians and bureaucrats would rush to get rid…

Banking and Finance

• By: Daniel Press
• 08/27/2018

One would expect that years of failing policy would force policymakers to reconsider the wisdom of their actions. But not for the Australian Productivity Commission,…

Banking and Finance

• 08/24/2018

The undersigned organizations support your bill, the Death Tax Repeal Act. We appreciate your work to lead the country towards a common sense tax code that…

Financial Regulation

• 08/23/2018

On behalf of our organizations and Americans we represent, we write to express support of your legislation, H.R. 5470. This legislation will eliminate the Office…

Banking and Finance

• By: John Berlau
• 08/23/2018

Today, the Senate Banking Committee will likely vote to send the nomination of Kathleen Kraninger for director of the Bureau of Consumer Financial Protection to…

Banking and Finance

• John Berlau
• 08/22/2018

Competitive Enterprise Institute Senior Fellow John Berlau expressed CEI’s support for President Trump’s nominee to head the Bureau of Consumer Financial Protection:…

Banking and Finance

• By: Daniel Press
• 08/21/2018

Last Monday, the California Supreme Court ruled that interest rates on loans over $2,500 could be deemed ‘unconscionable’ even if usury laws permit them. In…

Banking and Finance

• By: John Berlau
• 08/17/2018

As far as politicians’ transgressions go, I usually don’t get that riled up about hypocrisy. In the course of voting on and debating so many…

Banking and Finance

• By: Marlo Lewis, Jr.
• 08/11/2018

The Wall Street Journal reported late last Friday that Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) regulators have “decided against trying to penalize the energy giant over its…

Banking and Finance

• By: Devin Watkins
• 08/10/2018

In the last decade there has been a kind of separation of powers renaissance in the courts. Previously, separation-of-powers cases were rare and usually occurred…

Banking and Finance

• By: John Berlau
• 08/08/2018

In March, the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals killed the Obama administration’s “fiduciary rule,” a prime example of the “bureaucrats know best” type of…

Banking and Finance

• By: John Berlau
• 08/03/2018

The July 31 policy statement by the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC) announcing that it will now grant “special purpose national…

Banking and Finance

• By: Daniel Press
• 08/01/2018

After years of speculation, the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC) announced Tuesday that it would begin considering applications for special purpose…

Banking and Finance

• By: Daniel Press
• 07/30/2018

Earlier this month, the New York Department of Financial Services (NYDFS) released a study of online lending, including findings and recommendations for changes in…

Banking and Finance

• By: Daniel Press
• 07/24/2018

Big news out of the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals—the Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA) is unconstitutionally structured. The FHFA was created in the wake…

Banking and Finance

• By: John Berlau
• 07/23/2018

Eight years ago this month, the Democrat-controlled House and Senate passed and President Barack Obama signed into law the so-called Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and…

Banking and Finance

• By: Daniel Press
• 07/17/2018

Kathy Kraninger, President Trump’s nominee to head the Bureau of Consumer Financial Protection (formerly known as the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, or CFPB), will…

Banking and Finance

• By: John Berlau
• 06/27/2018

My colleagues Trey Kovacs and Iain Murray and, in Forbes, Wayne Crews, give mixed reviews to President Trump’s long-awaited executive branch reorganization…

Banking and Finance

• By: Daniel Press
• 06/20/2018

When Congress passed the Dodd-Frank Act in 2010, there was an unprecedented allocation of power to the Bureau of Consumer Financial Protection (BCFP—previously known as…

Financial Regulation

• By: Daniel Press
• 06/19/2018

On behalf of the Competitive Enterprise Institute (CEI), we are pleased to provide the following comments on the Bureau of Consumer Financial Protection’s (Bureau or…

Banking and Finance

• John Berlau
• 06/18/2018

Over the past weekend, President Trump nominated Kathy Kraninger, an associate director at the Office of Management and Budget, to head the Bureau of Consumer…

Financial Regulation

• By: John Berlau
• 06/18/2018

Congress and President Trump recently gave Main Street banks and credit unions some much-need but still modest relief from the mountains of red tape stemming…

Banking and Finance

• By: Daniel Press
• 06/13/2018

In CEI’s “Free to Prosper: A Pro-Growth Agenda for the 115th Congress,” my colleagues John Berlau and Iain Murray made the enduring recommendation…

Banking and Finance

• By: Daniel Press
• 06/08/2018

This week, the Competitive Enterprise Institute submitted comments to the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, on how it could improve its rulemaking to provide a better…

Banking and Finance

• By: Daniel Press, Devin Watkins, Sam Kazman
• 06/08/2018

On behalf of the Competitive Enterprise Institute (CEI), we are pleased to provide the following comments on the Bureau of Consumer Financial Protection’s (bureau or…

Banking and Finance

• By: Daniel Press
• 05/25/2018

Under the letter of the law, banks can now reenter the small-dollar lending space. On Wednesday, the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC)…

Banking and Finance

• By: John Berlau
• 05/24/2018

The New York Times cited CEI’s John Berlau on the limitations of current deregulatory reforms in disassembling the Dodd-Frank Act, which burdens consumers, investors, and…

Banking and Finance

• By: John Berlau
• 05/23/2018

Reason cited John Berlau on the boon to small banks in being able to provide financial relief to Americans that is occuring with deregulation of…

Banking and Finance

• 05/23/2018

View Full Document as PDF The Honorable Orrin G. Hatch Chairman, U.S. Senate Committee on Finance 219 Dirksen Senate Office Building…

Banking and Finance

• John Berlau
• 05/22/2018

Today, the House considered and passed The Economic Growth, Regulatory Relief, and Consumer Protection Act aimed at scaling back a few bad Dodd-Frank bank regulations. CEI Senior Fellow…

Banking and Finance

• By: Daniel Press
• 05/22/2018

This week President Trump signed a resolution of disapproval overturning one of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau’s most controversial regulatory actions—the inappropriate application of…

Banking and Finance

• By: Daniel Press
• 05/16/2018

Just last week, Congress voted to overturn one of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau’s most controversial regulatory actions—a guidance document that was used…

Banking and Finance

• Daniel Press
• 05/15/2018

A new Competitive Enterprise Institute report urges the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau to remedy Obama-era misuse of a 1970s law, the Equal Credit Opportunity Act…

Banking and Finance

• By: Daniel Press
• 05/15/2018

View Full Document as PDF Freedom, equality, and justice are all bedrock principles of the American experiment. Yet it is no secret…

Banking and Finance

• By: John Berlau
• 05/15/2018

Today is the 21st anniversary of the initial public offering of a little company called Amazon. Yes, today Amazon is a behemoth, a supposed…

Financial Regulation

• By: Daniel Press
• 05/08/2018

Like clockwork, every so often a new member of Congress will rehash an old, tired idea: having the United States Postal Service (USPS) make short-term,…

Banking and Finance

• By: Daniel Press
• 05/07/2018

This week, Congress has a unique opportunity to repeal one of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau’s worst regulatory actions. Using the Congressional Review Act (CRA),…

Financial Regulation

• By: Daniel Press
• 05/04/2018

Congress has a dwindling number of days left to stop a Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) regulation that will make payday loans difficult for consumers to get.

Banking and Finance

• By: Iain Murray
• 05/01/2018

It’s May Day, and in the pages of the New York Times appears a paean to the halcyon days of the 1930s, urging a…

Banking and Finance

• By: John Berlau
• 04/25/2018

After being attacked repeatedly for supposedly being soft on Wall Street and the “big banks,” Acting Consumer Financial Protection Bureau Director Mick Mulvaney was part…

Banking and Finance

• John Berlau
• 04/18/2018

In the wake of a court ruling against a controversial Obama-era Labor Department rule expanding liability for investment advice, the Securities and Exchange Commission today…

Financial Regulation

• By: John Berlau
• 04/04/2018

John Berlau writes a letter-to-the-editor to The Wall Street Journal about the dangers of the U.S. government issuing its own digital currency.  After Kevin Warsh…

Banking and Finance

• By: Daniel Press
• 04/03/2018

On Monday, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau released its first semi-annual report to Congress under its new Acting Director, Mick Mulvaney. A routine procedure…

Banking and Finance

• By: Daniel Press
• 03/27/2018

While the United States continues to have healthy development of financial technologies—thanks predominately to unparalleled access to capital and technology—it is at risk of falling…

Banking and Finance

• By: John Berlau
• 03/26/2018

On Saturday, March 24th, from 8:30 to 9:30 PM in their local time zones, some people will turn off their lights as part of an…

Banking and Finance

• By: Daniel Press
• 03/24/2018

As the only state where all four North American deserts reside, it’s fitting that Arizona became the first state to establish a “sandbox” for financial…

Banking and Finance

• Daniel Press, John Berlau
• 03/14/2018

The Competitive Enterprise Institute (CEI) commends the U.S. Senate on passage of Sen. Crapo's S. 2155, the Economic Growth, Regulatory Relief and Consumer Protection Act.

Banking and Finance

• By: Daniel Press
• 03/13/2018

The Senate is expected to vote on its first major piece of financial reform this week since the Dodd-Frank Act of 2010. A bipartisan bill…

Banking and Finance

• By: Daniel Press
• 03/07/2018

Amazon's move into banking services spells good news for currently under-served consumers, who often rely on relatively expensive financial services such as payday lending or…

Banking and Finance

• By: Daniel Press
• 03/06/2018

Many in the financial services industry seem to believe the CFPB's ability to replay rule doesn’t impact them and it’s not worth fighting. That is…

Banking and Finance

• By: Daniel Press
• 03/02/2018

One of the most misunderstood and underappreciated aspects of free market economics is the idea of private or “self” regulation. Up until recently, private enterprises…

Banking and Finance

• By: Iain Murray
• 02/23/2018

The Washington Times quoted Iain Murray on the need for Congress to disapprove of the CFPB’s egregious rule against small dollar loans.  President Trump signed…

Banking and Finance

• By: John Berlau
• 02/23/2018

The Washington Examiner quoted John Berlau in the need for regulatory reform and the need to eliminate the cache of consumer data which the CFPB…

Banking and Finance

• By: Jenny Grimberg, John Berlau
• 02/16/2018

When other financial institutions that received TARP funds paid back what they owed to the U.S. Treasury in full, the government relinquished its ownership stake…

Banking and Finance

• By: Daniel Press
• 02/15/2018

RealClearMarkets quoted Daniel Press on banking regulations impact on the banking system. Ronald Reagan once said, “No government ever voluntarily reduces itself in…

Banking and Finance