Interchange
Interchange fees are an extremely controversial issue. CBA strongly opposes any government intrusion into the market pricing of interchange fees. The debit and credit card markets are extremely competitive at the card issuer, merchant bank and card network levels. Governmental intrusion into the setting of interchange fees is wholly unwarranted and, like other government intrusion into properly functioning markets, will have undesirable and unintended consequences. CBA believes the ensuing negative effects on consumers of the debit interchange regulation will highlight the harm of governmental price fixing, making it difficult to produce any successful legislative or regulatory efforts that seek to do further harm to interchange rates.
- January 20, 2015CBA’s President and CEO Richard Hunt issued the following statement after the U.S. Supreme Court decided not to disturb the court of appeals decision in NACS v. Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System. The court of appeals previously rejected the retailers’ efforts to increase further the $6 billion annual windfall they secured with the promulgation of the Fed’s interchange price cap...September 26, 2014CFPB Announces Project Catalyst Pilot On Thursday, September 25, 2014, the CFPB announced a research pilot titled Project Catalyst to examine the effectiveness of early intervention credit counseling for consumers who are at risk of default on their credit card debt. "Managing credit card debt can be stressful for consumers and will affect their ability to access credit in the future," said CFPB...August 15, 2014Is $20 Billion the New $10 Billion? The retail banking industry is very familiar with banks taking steps not to pass the $10 billion asset mark in order to avoid the associated massive regulatory and compliance costs. Consider Cathy Nash who sold Citizens Republic Bancorp when it reached $9.7 billion in assets to FirstMerit in 2012. Now there is another reason – the cut in interchange fees. The...August 1, 2014CBA Testifies Before Senate Banking Committee This week, I testified before the U.S. Senate Banking Committee on the state of the private student loan industry and campus financial products. This was an opportunity to demonstrate the excellent performance and repayment metrics of private student loans. Compared with federal loans, which have a 15% default rate, private loans are getting it right...July 11, 2014CFPB Takes Action Against Payday Lender On Thursday, July 10, 2014, the CFPB took enforcement action against a large payday lender, ACE Cash Express, for allegedly pushing payday borrowers into a cycle of debt. The CFPB found ACE, headquartered in Irving, TX, used illegal debt collection tactics, including harassment and false threats of lawsuits or criminal prosecution, to pressure overdue...
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