Revised rules implementing anti-redlining statutes will “support more impactful bank lending, investing, and services in today’s banking environment,” the Federal Reserve’s top supervisor said Wednesday – but he gave no date for when those rules will be released.
Speaking in a recorded video to a conference of the National Community Reinvestment Coalition in Washington, D.C., Federal Reserve Board Vice Chair for Supervision Michael Barr said that the three federal banking agencies (the Fed, Office of the Comptroller of the Currency [OCC] and the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. [FDIC]) “are diligently working together to craft a final rule in light of the extensive public comments we received on our proposal.”
Barr asserted that the agencies have been “inclusive and analytical” in considering Community Reinvestment Act (CRA) rule reform. “Extensive stakeholder engagement and policy deliberations directly informed our proposal last year,” he said.
But he offered no insight as to when the final rule would be released by the agencies. He did, however, repeat the four priorities for the agencies in finalizing rule reform. Those are:
- Advancing the core purpose of the statute.
- Addressing the significant changes in the banking sector since the regulations were last substantially revised more than a quarter-century ago (such as evaluating online and mobile banking, branchless banking, and hybrid models).
- Providing greater clarity, consistency, and transparency “so that everyone—the public, community groups, and banks—understands what counts for CRA consideration and how a bank’s rating is determined” with a metric-based approach to CRA evaluations.
- Aligning evaluations and data collection to bank size and type.
The three agencies released a proposed rule reforming CRA rules in spring of 2022 (about a year ago); comments were collected until Aug. 5.