US Rep Frank: Consumer Agency To Take Hard Line On Enforcement
By Kristina Peterson, Of DOW JONES NEWSWIRES
WASHINGTON -(Dow Jones)- U.S. Rep. Barney Frank promised Friday morning that
the consumer protection agency approved the day before by a House committee
would take a hard line on enforcement.
Frank, D-Mass., pointed specifically to services often aimed at lower-income
people, including payday lending and check cashers, as targets of increased
monitoring.
"There will be no more unregulated consumer activity," Frank said at a
conference on financial options for people without bank accounts. "This bill
explicitly empowers them to impose regulations on payday lenders, check cashers
and people who send remittances." The House Financial Services Committee, which
he chairs, on Thursday approved the formation of a new consumer financial
protection agency to guard against lax regulations and abusive consumer
practices.
"One of the things we keep stressing is the lower your income is in America,
the higher the percentage of that income you pay in transaction costs and we
need to change that," said Frank.
The agency will be more effective in protecting consumers because it will have
no superseding goals, Frank said.
The U.S. Federal Reserve must also focus on ensuring the safety and soundness
of banks, he said, adding that Former Fed chairman Alan Greenspan did not make
consumer protections a top priority.
"[Current Fed Chair Ben] Bernanke has been, better but it’s still not
close to the core mission of the Federal Reserve," Frank said. "It would be like
asking me to be the judge of the Miss America contest," he joked.
Frank also noted that the new agency would be monitoring the new but quickly
growing prepaid card industry, as well as some of banks' more controversial
practices.
"We are going to be cracking down on overdraft fees and prepaid cards," he
said.
-By Kristina Peterson, Dow Jones Newswires; 202-862-6619; kristina.peterson@
dowjones.com
(END) Dow Jones Newswires
10-23-090943ET
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