Change Overview and Rationale
In Congressional testimony on June 22, 2017, Federal Reserve Governor Jerome H. Powell highlighted the progress that has been made since the financial crisis in improving the resiliency and resolvability of the U.S. banking industry. Having achieved the primary goals of re-regulation, however, Powell believes that the time is ripe “for us to look for ways to reduce unnecessary burden.”
The London Interbank Offered Rate (LIBOR) has been the primary short-term reference interest rate for nearly fifty years. Following a scandal wherein employees of rate-setting banks were implicated in manipulating LIBOR, U.S., European, and other regulators embarked on efforts to reform or replace the benchmark rate. At its height, LIBOR was the global benchmark interest rate for an estimated $300 trillion in derivatives, loans, and mortgages.
In a sparsely worded press release on January 3, 2017, the Bank for International Settlements announced that the January 8 meeting of the group of central bank governors and heads of supervision (GHOS) has been postponed. At this meeting, the GHOS were to finalize long awaited rules that will determine how much capital lenders have to set aside against loans and other assets. Citing unfinished work necessary to calibrate banks’ risk-weighted capital ratios, BIS chose to move finalization off for the present.
In her keynote address at the 2017 Brodsky Family Northwestern JD-MBA Lecture Series, CFTC Commissioner Sharon Y. Bowen described her thinking on the key trends driving regulatory activity. Commissioner Bowen identified “four disruptive elements” she believes are substantially responsible for changes that have been seen recently in financial markets. In turn, these disruptive elements are prompting questions about what they mean for markets and society, and what actions we should ask from regulators.
In response to Executive Order 13772, on June 14, 2017 Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin published a report identifying recommendations for changes to the regulation of the U.S. financial system in a manner consistent with the Executive Order’s “core principles.” Some of the “core principles” laid out in the executive order are addressed in bills currently being debated in Congress. The report takes up some of these same issues, but with slightly different approaches than those proposed by legislators.
In speeches on April 5 and May 25, 2017, William Coen, Secretary General of the Basel Committee, hinted that final Basel III standards are “just around the corner.” Despite a setback in January 2017 in which the Committee members could not reach accord on the calibration of the aggregate output floor, Coen signaled optimism for the upcoming meeting the Committee in June.
In a keynote address before the Systemic Risk and Organization of the Financial System Conference in California on May 12, 2017 FDIC Vice Chairman Tom Hoenig announced his novel market-based proposal to strengthen the financial system and provide regulatory relief and foster long-term economic growth. According to Hoenig, even after the financial crisis, “the U.S. financial system remains heavily subsidized, increasingly concentrated, and, despite a host of new efforts to safeguard the system, it continues to be vulnerable to inevitable financial shocks.”
On June 26, 2017, the Supreme Court handed down a 5-4 decision which ended California Public Employees’ Retirement System’s (“CaLPERS”) efforts to spin off its own Lehman-related claims from a larger class action because the claims were filed late. The Court held that the three-year time limit in Section 13 of the Securities Act of 1933 is a statute of repose.
In a speech before the US Chamber of Commerce’s 11th Annual Capital Market Summit, the CFTC’s acting Chairman J. Christopher Giancarlo announced a new project to simplify the agency’s regulations. Remarking that, “America’s derivatives markets are struggling, in some cases, under the weight of flawed and excessive regulation,” Chairman Giancarlo introduced the CFTC’s new focus on reinterpreting its regulatory mission consistent with the goals of the Trump Administration’s Executive Order on regulation:
A Federal Reserve Report published on April 18, 2017 found that U.S. small businesses are facing hurdles in obtaining much-needed financing for growth. The study indicated that small businesses presently face significantly more stringent credit conditions when approaching their traditional sources of loans for equipment and expansion. The Fed report itself does not point the finger at regulation as the cause for this restriction in the ability of small businesses to access credit. However, large banks have had to tighten credit conditions significantly as a result of increased capital requirements, liquidity restrictions, and stress tests. Because these big banks are the primary source of the for all business financing in the U.S., and the number one source of loans to small businesses, any restrictions on the flow of financing arising out of new banking regulation will perforce affect small businesses.