The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau has finalized a rule required by Congress to increase transparency in small business lending, promote economic development, and combat unlawful discrimination. Lenders will collect and report information about the small business credit applications they receive, including geographic and demographic data, lending decisions, and the price of credit. A summary, with […]
Category Archives: Other Lending, Debt, and Credit Issues
The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau released today a special edition of its Supervisory Highlights that reports on unlawful junk fees uncovered in deposit accounts and in multiple loan servicing markets, including in mortgage, student, and payday lending. The CFPB explains that “[t]hese unlawful fees corrode family finances, force up families’ banking and borrowing costs, and […]
The question in the case, Santos v. Yellowfin Loan Servicing Corp., No. 22-0910 (Tex. S. Ct.), is whether a claim to collect a deficiency judgment on a second mortgage accrues when that judgment is entered or whenever in the future the lender (or its successor in interest) decides to “accelerate” the original mortgage loan. Lenders […]
A recent Washington Post article looks at “a big, fat map of credit scores reproduced from a recent economics paper” and finds “any number of tantalizing questions.” But “most intrigu[ing]” is “that big band of credit-score calamity that stretches across the American South”: “Almost every corner of America’s most populous region — every race, every […]
Shady auto dealer practices take center stage in the Federal Trade Commission’s latest report on its 2022 enforcement activities related to fair lending. Each year, the FTC submits a letter to the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau recounting actions it took tied to the Equal Credit Opportunity Act, a law to combat discrimination in lending. Last […]
The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau has issued “an advisory opinion to protect Americans from double dealing on digital mortgage comparison-shopping platforms. Companies operating these digital platforms appear to shoppers as if they provide objective lender comparisons, but may illegally refer people to only those lenders paying referral fees. When shoppers use a lender that is […]
The Supreme Court on Friday granted review of a case that arises from a payday loan to a consumer from a corporate entity owned by a Native American tribe. The issue in the case is whether the Bankruptcy Code abrogates tribal sovereign immunity. Given the prevalence of internet-based payday lending affiliated with tribal lenders, the […]
In late December, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau released a report covering the financial health of American households. Here is the report summary: In 2022, consumer financial health continued to be buoyed by pandemic relief, high employment, and increased savings accumulated during the first year of the pandemic. But financial health was no longer as […]
Here. The first episode features a conversation with Abbye Atkinson, professor at Berkeley Law, about her article, Borrowing Equality, published in the Columbia Law Review, and the relationship among credit, debt, social relationships, inequality, and what should be done to pave the way for a better world for borrowers. The podcast will broadcast conversations with […]
The effort was led by Berkeley's Center for Consumer Law and Economic Justice and resulted in production of a series of short memoranda available here. Topics covered include discrimination, arbitration, income share agreements, BNPL, substitution effects of regulation, disclosures, overdraft protections, and more.