Politics

The Federal Housing Administration removed housing finance firms from the list of permitted interested-party contributors in a new reverse-mortgage rule.

Banks and other financial market participants have been keyed into the central bank's communications around monetary policy expectations. But in an unpredictable economy, the guidance doesn't always hit the mark.

The Federal Housing Finance Agency rule originally proposed last year aims to make it tougher to roll back measures designed to encourage more equitable lending.

A pair of bills, one with bipartisan support, look to address the issues around heirs' property so these families can have clear title on their homes.

Recent economic data have shown inflation stubbornly above the Fed's 2% target, putting rate cuts in jeopardy. Lauren Saidel-Baker, an economist with ITR Economics, parses the FOMC meeting, Chair Powell's press conference and takes a look at future policy.

A majority of consumers earning more than $100,000 annually said they were concerned about their own ability to purchase a home, demonstrating how affordability issues are impacting those at many socioeconomic levels, the University of Michigan study found.

Many legal experts think the Supreme Court will rule in favor of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau in a case challenging its funding. Such a ruling would unleash a flurry of litigation that has been on hold pending the outcome of the constitutional challenge.

The Federal Housing Administration, the Department of Veterans Affairs and the Federal Housing Finance Agency have started gathering data and analyzing how climate risk will impact the housing ecosystem.

The Federal Reserve's Office of the Inspector General says the Fed has yet to fulfill 65 recommendations, and also identified 18 outstanding issues at the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau.

According to the Federal Reserve Board's latest financial stability report, persistent inflation and policy uncertainty are the primary worries for banks. Survey respondents expressed heightened anxiety over murky policy outlooks due to geopolitical turmoil and rapidly approaching domestic elections.

McCargo stabilized the agency at a crucial time as she helped navigate it through both a pandemic and subsequent dramatic interest-rate cycle change.

The quasi-public entity's plan to buy certain closed-end seconds would constitute "unnecessary government encroachment," the Structured Finance Association said.

In a Senate hearing, Director Sandra Thompson said a raise to the required income threshold provided to affordable housing was on the table, while housing regulators also faced questions related to property insurance hikes and title insurance waivers.

The CFPB has dissolved the Office of Supervision, Enforcement and Fair Lending and eliminated the job of associate director in a move that impacts how it designates nonbanks for supervision.

The push comes amid what one expert highlighted as lax funding efforts for two Department of Housing and Urban Development grant programs.

The Federal Reserve chair's comments coincide with the spring meeting of the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank Group in Washington. They also come as groups like the Basel Committee on Banking Supervision are being scrutinized.

The Federal Home Loan Bank System stepped up advances by 37% or more to Silicon Valley, Signature and First Republic banks ahead of their failures, the GAO says in a post-mortem on last year's banking crisis. The findings add to the debate about whether the system should be a lender of last resort.

Sens. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., and Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., detailed how New York Community Bancorp grew to exceed the $100 billion threshold that triggers tougher regulatory requirements and set the bank on a path to market turmoil via a series of deals that were approved, in part, by the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency.

The move advances the Biden administration's interest in testing whether skipping a title insurance policy or an alternative for some mortgages would be a cost-saver.

Rep. Andy Barr, R-Ky., and Sen. Thom Tillis, R-N.C., told the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau that pursuing a rulemaking on forced arbitration, as laid out by consumer advocates' rulemaking petition, would be an "affront to Congress."