Regulators have adopted a final rule allowing community banks to engage in proprietary trading.
Proposed changes would ease the rule's strict limits on proprietary trading by banks.
Here are some steps to begin resolving the divide between bringing regulatory relief to banks and adequately protecting consumers.
Proposed massive legislative change is unlikely; more moderate reforms floated by Treasury are better bets.
While preventing another financial crisis is paramount, there were a number of unintended consequences of the law.
The Financial Choice Act passed the House on a party-line vote but “there is zero chance that [it] survives” in its current form in the Senate.
The proposed law would significantly amend the Dodd-Frank Act and restore flexibility to financial institutions.
How many of its myriad provisions are really worth replacing flexible supervision of banks with rigid regulation?
The regulations coming out of the law are driving community banks to consolidate and making them less profitable.
A report by the Volcker Alliance calls for a "long-delayed" reshaping of the U.S. bank regulatory system.
Financial institutions would like another seven years to divest of their private equity holdings.
A push to make banks safer creates new uncertainties.
