CRL in the News

Thousands of Marriott workers around the country are on strike, complaining that stagnant wages and unsteady hours have made it difficult to stay afloat. At a time when they are under particular pressure, the credit union may be adding to their struggles. Overdraft fees in particular have provoked controversy within the credit union world. “We have a hard time taking...

How much has the market learned from the financial crisis a decade back? And are we prepared for the next crisis? Looking specifically at the housing market, Michael Calhoun, President of the Brookings Center for Responsible Lending said in a recent paper that while regulatory safeguards that were put in place subsequent to the crisis have made today’s housing market...

Last October, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau released its payday and car-title lending rule. The agency, under the leadership of Richard Cordray, spent five years developing these safeguards, which included input from lenders, faith leaders, veteran and military organizations, civil rights groups, consumer advocates, and constituents from across the country. This was the first time that a federal agency rolled...

When LendMark started offering subprime loans to California residents a few years ago, it noticed something odd: a vast and growing number of big loans offered by rival firms at interest rates of 100% or higher, and relatively few smaller, cheaper loans. To executives at the suburban Atlanta company, which entered the state by buying loan storefronts from a competitor...

U.S. Bank recently introduced a new small-dollar loan product. By the bank’s own description, it’s a high-cost product, at 70-88% APR. High-cost loans by banks offer a mirage of respectability. A component of this illusion is the misguided idea that limiting payment size to 5% of gross income means the loan is affordable for most borrowers. But these products will...

California Gov. Jerry Brown signed three bills Sunday that could have a sizable impact on banks and other lenders in the nation’s most populous state. The most prominent of the three requires publicly traded companies that are headquartered in California to add more women to their boards. Brown also signed legislation imposing new disclosure requirements for certain small-business loans by...

Uncertainty around the legal and regulatory status of loans made through bank partnerships with financial technology firms is an obstacle to innovation and greater credit availability and should be cleared up legislatively, a panel of U.S. House lawmakers heard Friday.

As Congress struggles over how best to regulate fintech companies, credit unions on Friday renewed their call for a regulatory regime that is as strict as the one they must follow. The emergence of new financial products should not lead to a loosening of consumer protections, Scott Astrada, director of federal Advocacy at the Center for Responsible Lending, told the...

Consumer advocates for years have decried payday loans as a costly way to borrow and one that keeps people trapped in a cycle of high-interest debt. The howls of protest could grow louder now than a major bank has stepped forward with a similar product.

Listen to an interview with CRL's Rebecca Borné on the Money Life podcast discussing U.S. Bank’s new dangerous payday loan alternative product, Simple Loan.