In the News

Some of the critics of Square’s application include Americans for Financial Reform and The National Community Reinvestment Coalition, both of which wrote letters to the FDIC opposing the application.

The U.S. loan servicing industry, easily overlooked during good economic times, is now facing its most challenging moment since the financial crisis of 2008 and 2009.

Families and businesses in southeast Queens are being shunned by the banking system, possibly in violation of federal law. And that makes Rep. Gregory Meeks furious.

As the novel coronavirus hammers the global economy, lawmakers and housing advocates are calling for a national moratorium on evictions and foreclosures while cities on each coast have started taking their own actions.

On March 6, the Student Borrower Protection Center, Americans for Financial Reform Education Fund, the National Community Reinvestment Coalition and the National Consumer Law Center sent a letter to the Alternative Reference Rate Committee (AARC) urging the AARC “to consider the unique risks inherent to the private student loan market and to prioritize the protection of student loan borrowers” in connection with the change from LIBOR to the new Secured Overnight Financing Rate (SOFR) index.

According to the National Community Reinvestment Coalition, from 2009-2018 CRA qualified lending in Greater Hartford resulted in $8.2 billion in mortgages to LMI homeowners or in LMI neighborhoods, and $1.9 billion in small business loans in LMI neighborhoods.

The National Community Reinvestment Coalition found that weakening CRA would result in a loss of 10-20% in the volume of loans made in low- and moderate-income census tracts. In Minnesota, that would mean up to a $1.9 billion decrease in lending to small businesses and home purchases over five years.

Loans that are eligible for Community Reinvestment Act credit totaled billions of dollars in investment across Ohio from 2009-2018, according to the National Community Reinvestment Coalition.

“The agencies would lessen the public accountability of banks to their communities by enacting performance measures on CRA exams that would be complex and opaque while at the same time over-simplifying how to measure bank’s responsiveness to local needs,” the NCRC said.

“The proposal is so fundamentally flawed it really needs a rethink,” said Jesse Van Tol, chief executive of the National Community Reinvestment Coalition, an advocacy group.

Data gathered by the nonpartisan association the National Community Reinvestment Coalition in 2014 identified major barriers to women- and minority-owned small businesses lending.

The reform community groups most dreaded is what they call “one ratio.” “The comptroller has a notion that this would make life easier for bank CEOs,” says Josh Silver of the National Community Reinvestment [Coalition.]

Picture this: under the proposed regulations, a bank that invests in upgrading an athletic stadium located in a low- and moderate-income census tract, as long as it is in one of the Trump Administration’s “opportunity zones,” will get CRA credit.

It’s getting harder to be considered wealthy in the District of Columbia. In 2019, the percentage of D.C. residents reporting at least $100,001 in personal income hit an all-time high.

“When local branches close, those relationships are lost, resulting in the loss of credit that local businesses need to thrive,” said Jason Richardson, Director of Research and Evaluation at the National Community Reinvestment Coalition.