The report is here. This looks bad. This is the Golden Valley case in which the lender charged up to 950%. Here's an excerpt: Mulvaney declined requests for an interview. In an email, his press representative first said the decision to drop the Golden Valley lawsuit was made by "professional career staff" and not Mulvaney. […]
Author Archives: Jeff Sovern
by Jeff Sovern I am very late to this particular party, but back in November, the Second Circuit decided ARIAS v. GUTMAN, MINTZ, BAKER & SONNENFELDT LLP, an important FDCPA case dealing with a collector-law firm's attempt to collect funds that were exempt from collection. After the firm froze the money in the consumer's bank account, the […]
by Jeff Sovern Last month, Interim Director Mulvaney announced that the Bureau may reconsider the Bureau's payday lending rule. But he can't just rescind it. That would require a full notice-and-comment rulemaking, and that would take longer than Mulvaney will be at the CFPB (under the Vacancies Act, he is limited to 210 days). True, […]
by Jeff Sovern AccountsRecovery.Net reports on an interview, largely about debt collection, with the Acting Director of the FTC's Consumer Protection Bureau, Thomas Pahl, at a Receivables Management Association conference this week. Some excerpt: “It’s difficult to speak about where the agency is headed given the organization is changing,” Pahl said during his session, adding that […]
Adam J. Levitin of Georgetown, Patricia A. McCoy of Boston College Law School, Kathleen C. Engel of Suffolk, and Dalié Jiménez of California-Irvine, Connecticut School of Law; and Harvard's Center on the Legal Profession have authored Brief of Amici Curiae Consumer Financial Regulation Scholars in Support of Plaintiff-Appellant Leandra English, English v. Trump, No. 18-5007 (D.C. […]
Quoting from the announcement: In its six-year existence, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) has proved itself integral to curbing predatory lending and other practices that harm American consumers every day, a survey from the National Association of Consumer Advocates (NACA) shows. The survey found that consumers and their advocates enforce and rely on the […]
by Jeff Sovern My latest op-ed. Excerpt: It seems unlikely that the bureau would take on a bank like Wells Fargo for [opening unauthorized accounts] or pursue many of Cordray’s other actions now that Mulvaney is in charge. His boss has even praised a bill passed by the House that would strip the CFPB of the authority […]
by Jeff Sovern Income inequality causes numerous problems for the United States, including lower economic growth. Probably the most widely-mentioned solution to income inequality is taxation, But Rory Van Loo of Boston University argues that consumer law also poses a potent weapon against income inequality in his paper, Consumer Law As Tax Alternative. One intriguing aspect […]
by Jeff Sovern Yesterday I expressed doubt about whether it matters if the CFPB backs off on investigating Equifax. Now I'm wondering if I was wrong to do so. I hadn't given enough thought to the CFPB's supervisory responsibilities over collection bureaus. Vox has an article which reports: A CFPB spokesperson said in an email to […]
by Jeff Sovern The answer to the question is that I'm not sure it does. Brian reported earlier today that Reuters is saying that the CFPB has put its Equifax probe on ice. But Reuters also reports that Equifax says it is under investigation by every state AG, that the FTC is investigating, and that […]