“Although there may be other constitutional checks on Congress’ authority to create and fund an administrative agency, specifying the source and purpose is all the control the Appropriations Clause requires.” With these words, seven members of the Supreme Court upheld the constitutionality of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau’s funding mechanism and forestalled the possibility that
On April 22, 2024, the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) published its final rule regarding updated flood insurance requirements in certain areas of the country: Floodplain Management and Protection of Wetlands; Minimum Property Standards for Flood Hazard Exposure; Building to the Federal Flood Risk Management Standard. The new rule implements the
The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) recently issued its final rule to implement Section 1071 of the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act. The rule amends the Equal Credit Opportunity Act (ECOA), introducing substantial data collection and reporting requirements for small business lenders and finance companies. In this blog post, we delve deeper
Less than three years after the U.S. Supreme Court reviewed the CFPB’s appointment structure, the bureau again finds itself before the Court in what could prove the most consequential case for the financial services industry in years. Four months ago, the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals issued a decision in Community Financial Services Association of
As the regulatory scrutiny facing commercial finance providers continues to increase, many have been closely monitoring developments in state-level disclosure requirements. The New York Commercial Finance Disclosure Law (CFDL), which was originally enacted in 2020, stands out as the most comprehensive commercial disclosure law to date. And with the release of the final regulations on
On October 19, 2022, the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals issued its opinion in Community Financial Services Association of America, et al. v. CFPB (CFSA v. CFPB) invalidating the CFPB’s Payday, Vehicle-Title, and Certain High-Cost Installment Loans rule (Small-Dollar Rule). The three-member panel decision calls into question the future viability of the CFPB
In 2018, California became the first state to pass a commercial finance disclosure law (CDL) requiring certain commercial finance companies to make consumer-style disclosures to financing recipients. The CDL was the catalyst for the passage of similar laws in Utah, Virginia, and New York, and the introduction of commercial disclosure legislation in many other states
As discussed in prior posts and articles (here, here and here), in 2019 Congress passed the Small Business Reorganization Act creating new Subchapter V of Chapter 11 of the Bankruptcy Code. The purpose of Subchapter V was to make small business bankruptcies faster and less expensive. However, the substantial benefits of Subchapter
Until last month, government enforcement and regulatory scrutiny of fraud and other misconduct relating to COVID-19 relief programs was generally limited to end recipients of the relief. These efforts have mostly been directed to fraud in connection with the Paycheck Protection Program (PPP), a nearly $1 trillion business loan program administered by the Small Business
On March 15, 2022, the Consolidated Appropriations Act, 2022 – which included the Adjustable Interest Rate (LIBOR) Act – was signed into law. The LIBOR Act is meant to address concerns with ceasing the use of LIBOR by creating a uniform process for replacing LIBOR in those existing contracts that do not provide for the