On December 3, the CFPB filed a proposed settlement to resolve a long running lawsuit against a student loan relief company and its owner (collectively, the “Defendants”). The settlement bars the company from offering or providing debt settlement products. In addition, the Defendants must pay $2,000 in civil monetary penalties, an amount determined based on their inability to pay more.Continue Reading CFPB’s Settlement Imposes Permanent Ban on Defunct Student Loan Relief Company and Its Owner
On December 3, the CFPB announced a proposed rule to enhance oversight of data brokers that handle consumers’ sensitive personal and financial information. The proposed rule would amend Regulation V, which implements the Fair Credit Reporting Act (FCRA), to require data brokers to comply with credit bureau-style regulations under FCRA if they sell income data or certain other financial information on consumers, regardless of its end use.Continue Reading CFPB Takes Aim at Data Brokers in Proposed Rule Amending FCRA
On November 26, the U.S. Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals overturned sanctions imposed by the U.S. Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) against a decentralized cryptocurrency mixing service (a blockchain-based technology used to enable transaction anonymity) accused of facilitating money laundering.Continue Reading Fifth Circuit Overturns OFAC Sanctions on Blockchain-based Privacy Technology
On November 13, the Federal Reserve Board issued two cease and desist orders against a state-chartered bank and a bank holding company for alleged compliance deficiencies.Continue Reading Federal Reserve Board Penalizes Two Banks for Compliance Deficiencies
On November 21, the CFPB announced the arrival of its finalized larger participant rule (the “Rule”) regulating nonbank companies offering digital funds transfer and payment wallet applications to consumers.Continue Reading New CFPB Larger Participant Rule Boosts Oversight of Major Digital Payment Providers
Starting in February 2025, providers of (1) debt settlement services, (2) student debt relief services, (3) private postsecondary education financing, and (4) income-based advances (a/k/a earned wage access (EWA) products) must begin registering and conform to annual reporting requirements in order to operate in California. We previously discussed this rule here.Continue Reading California DFPI Poised to Fill Potential Regulatory Gap Amid Anticipated CFPB Leadership Shift
On November 15, the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Texas overseeing the ongoing legal challenge to the CFPB’s Section 1071 small business lending rule (previously discussed here, here, here, and here), issued an order denying the plaintiff trade groups’ motion to toll the deadlines of the rule while an appeal moves through the Fifth Circuit.Continue Reading Federal Court Denies Request to Delay CFPB’s Small Business Lending Rule as Compliance Deadlines Approach
On November 13, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau released a “pilot study” on the small business lending market revealing “significant disparities” in how lenders treat black and white small business owners. As part of its study, the CFPB conducted matched-pair testing at 50 bank branches in New York and Virginia using actors who posed as small business owners. Black participants were provided slightly more favorable financial profiles compared to the white participants. In many tests, the black and white participant each met with the same bank representative.Continue Reading CFPB Study Finds Differential Treatment in the Small Business Lending Market
On November 12, the CFPB released a report analyzing federal and state-level privacy protections for consumer financial data.Continue Reading CFPB Report Highlights Financial Data Protection Challenges
On November 14, the CFPB entered into a consent order with a telecommunications company and its subsidiaries (collectively, the “company”) for allegedly withdrawing millions of dollars from over half a million consumer accounts and preventing money transfers to incarcerated individuals, depriving them of essential goods like food, medicine, and clothing, in violation of the CFPA’s prohibitions on unfair acts or practices.Continue Reading CFPB Hits Telecom Giant with Fines for Alleged Exploitation of Incarcerated Consumers
On November 7, 2024, the CFPB ordered one of the largest credit unions in the nation to pay over $95 million for its practices related to the imposition of overdraft fees. The enforcement action addresses practices from 2017 to 2022 where the credit union charged overdraft fees on transactions that appeared to have sufficient funds, affecting consumers including those in the military community, in violation of the CFPA’s prohibition on unfair, deceptive, and abusive acts or practices.Continue Reading CFPB Imposes $95 Million Fine on Large Credit Union for Overdraft Fee Practices