Banking and Finance Law Commons^™

Challenging Payday Lenders By Opening Up The Market For Small-Dollar Loans, Eliza Platts-Mills, Justin Chung

Brigham Young University Journal of Public Law

“Why hasn’t someone else stepped in to lend at lower interest rates?” is the question frequently asked in discussions of payday loans. The average payday loan carries an Annual Percentage Rate (APR) of over 300%. Given the strength of th e payday lenders lobby at the federal and state level, one way to help low- and moderate-income households escape the financial harms of pa yday loans is to encourage other lenders to enter the small-dollar loan market and offer more affordable products. Over the past ten years, an array of affordable small-dollar loan programs offered by banks, credit unions, non-profit …

Challenging Payday Lenders By Opening Up The Market For Small-Dollar Loans, Rex E. Lee

Brigham Young University Journal of Public Law

“Why hasn’t someone else stepped in to lend at lower interest rates?” is the question frequently asked in discussions of payday loans. The average payday loan carries an Annual Percentage Rate (APR) of over 300%. Given the strength of th e payday lenders lobby at the federal and state level, one way to help low- and moderate-income households escape the financial harms of pa yday loans is to encourage other lenders to enter the small-dollar loan market and offer more affordable products. Over the past ten years, an array of affordable small-dollar loan programs offered by banks, credit unions, non-profit …

Given Today's New Wave Of Protectionsim, Is Antitrust Law The Last Hope For Preserving A Free Global Economy Or Another Nail In Free Trade's Coffin?, Allison Murray

Loyola of Los Angeles International and Comparative Law Review

No abstract provided.

Financial Repression In China: Short-Term Growth But Long-Term Crisis, Guangdong Xu, Michael Faure

Loyola of Los Angeles International and Comparative Law Review

No abstract provided.

Venezuela Undermines Gold Miner Crystallex's Attempts To Recover On Its Icsid Award, Sam Wesson

Loyola of Los Angeles International and Comparative Law Review

No abstract provided.

Table Of Contents, Seattle University Law Review

Seattle University Law Review

No abstract provided.

Evaluating The Costs And Benefits Of A Smart Contract Blockchain Framework For Credit Default Swaps, Ryan Clements

William & Mary Business Law Review

Despite wide speculation about its use-value, there are very few large-scale Blockchain implementations, particularly in sophisticated financial applications and mature markets. The extent of Blockchain’s disruptive potential in these domains is uncertain. This Article considers Blockchain’s use-value for credit default swap contract execution, fulfillment, and post-trade processing by using, as an assessment base, a series of derivative industry whitepapers, academic and technological evaluative studies, and commentary relating to current market undertakings. In summary, when applied to credit default swaps, there are many barriers to implementation, as well as costs, fragmentation risks, technological deficiencies, and practical drawbacks. As a result, there …

The Next Two Years Of Federal Housing Policy Could Be Positive Under Mark Calabria, David J. Reiss

Cornell Law Faculty Publications

The Trump administration is clearly working to put fair housing, fair lending, community reinvestment and consumer protection in deep freeze for the foreseeable future. So, from the perspective of an affordable housing advocate, there is a lot to oppose in the Trump agenda.But a move to redistribute credit risk in the mortgage market from the government to the private sector is not one of them, so long as housing proponents are able to protect programs that promote affordable housing and sustainable homeownership.

Suffocate Or Innovate: An Observation Of California's Regulatory Framework For Cryptocurrency, Jane Kim

Loyola of Los Angeles Law Review

Transactions involving cryptocurrency are rapidly gaining traction in the United States, prompting the need for regulation. Hence, California legislators proposed the cryptocurrency regulation Assembly Bill 1123. However, based upon the outcome of a virtually identical regulation in New York, this proposed bill is theoretically projected to stifle business growth and potential innovation. This Article focuses on one approach to remedy this by advocating for reform at the federal level and recommending the utilization of the regulatory sandbox as a framework for future regulation.

Gorsuch's Purgatory: Attempting To Define Debt Collector Under The Fair Debt Collection Practices Act, Matthew Haan

Georgia State University Law Review

Part I of this Note provides background on the FDCPA and the federal agencies charged with its enforcement. Part I also provides background on judicial analysis of the FDCPA before Henson v. Santander and explains the nature of the Supreme Court’s decision. Part II analyzes the ramifications of Henson v. Santander for debtors and debt purchasers. Part II also analyzes how the Supreme Court’s decision can affect the CFPB. Part III proposes and discusses a three-tiered solution that involves congressional and CFPB action and discusses what would happen if Congress and the CFPB left the solution up to the courts.

Blockchain-Based Token Sales, Initial Coin Offerings, And The Democratization Of Public Capital Markets, Jonathan Rohr, Aaron Wright

Articles

Best known for their role in the creation of cryptocurrencies like bitcoin, blockchains are revolutionizing the way technology entrepreneurs finance their business enterprises. In 2017 alone, tech entrepreneurs raised over $6 billion through the sale of blockchain-based digital tokens, with some sales lasting mere seconds before selling out. In a token sale, also referred to as an “initial coin offering” or “ICO,” organizers of a project sell digital tokens to members of the public to finance the development of new technological platforms and services. After the initial sale, cryptocurrency exchanges scattered across the globe list tokens for trading and facilitate …

Money As Infrastructure, Morgan Ricks

Vanderbilt Law School Faculty Publications

Traditional infrastructure regulation—the law of regulated industries—rests atop three pillars: rate regulation, entry restriction, and universal service. This mode of regulation has typically been applied to providers of network-type resources: resources that are optimally supplied as integrated systems. The monetary system is such a resource; and money creation is the distinctive function of banks. Bank regulation can therefore be understood as a subfield of infrastructure regulation. With few exceptions, modern academic treatments of banking have emphasized banks’ intermediation function and downplayed or ignored their monetary function. Concomitantly, in recent decades U.S. bank regulation has strayed from its infrastructural roots. This …

A Flood-Not A Ripple-Of Harm: Proximate Cause Under The Fair Housing Act, Justin P. Steil, Daniel Traficonte

Cardozo Law Review

Over the past decade, several city governments across the country have filed suits against banks pursuant to the Fair Housing Act seeking redress for municipal damages caused by the banks' discriminatory lending practices. Following the ruling in Bank of America Corp. v. City of Miami, lower courts are now confronting the question of where to "draw the line" of proximate causation under the Fair Housing Act, and specifically whether the harms experienced by cities as a result of banks' discriminatory lending meet the requirements of proximate causation. In suggesting a direction for lower courts, the Court in City of …

Exploring The Legal Issues Of Blockchain Applications, Nathan Fulmer

Akron Law Review

A decade ago, blockchain technology made its mainstream debut with the introduction of Bitcoin, a cryptocurrency that has generated a lot of buzz in the financial sector. Blockchain’s elegantly simple way of securely and reliably recording data gives the technology the power to disrupt multiple industries. Cryptocurrencies and smart contracts are blockchain’s most common applications, but it can be implemented in a variety of ways.

This article examines blockchain’s core characteristics and mechanics as they apply to its common applications like cryptocurrency and smart contracts, as well as other transactional uses. The author presents some of the legal issues that …

Reinventing The Wheel: How Securitization Can Bolster The Market For Residential Energy Efficiency Loans, Joseph Gonyeau

William & Mary Environmental Law and Policy Review

Currently, one of society’s greatest goals is the reduction of greenhouse gases. This goal is generally accepted worldwide, as evidenced by the Paris Climate Agreement, the parties to which agreed to establish frameworks for adopting clean energy and reducing greenhouse gases. After the United States’ controversial decision to withdraw from the Paris Agreement, the federal government’s future in reducing greenhouse gases remains uncertain. Despite this setback, there are existing programs aimed at reducing greenhouse gases in the United States that the government should ensure succeed. One such program is the Warehouse for Energy Efficiency Loans (“WHEEL”).

WHEEL operates as a …

Regulating Offshore Finance, William J. Moon

Faculty Scholarship

From the Panama Papers to the Paradise Papers, massive document leaks in recent years have exposed trillions of dollars hidden in small offshore jurisdictions. Attracting foreign capital with low tax rates and environments of secrecy, a growing number of offshore jurisdictions have emerged as major financial havens hosting thousands of hedge funds, trusts, banks, and insurance companies.

While the prevailing account has examined offshore financial havens as “tax havens” that facilitate the evasion or avoidance of domestic tax, this Article uncovers how offshore jurisdictions enable corporations to evade domestic regulatory law. Specifically, recent U.S. Supreme Court cases restricting the geographic …

Justice Kavanaugh, Lorenzo V. Sec, And The Post-Kennedy Supreme Court, Matthew C. Turk, Karen E. Woody

Scholarly Articles

This Article analyzes a recent Supreme Court case, Lorenzo v. Securities and Exchange Commission, and explains why it provides a valuable window into the Court's future now that Justice Kennedy has retired and his seat filled by Justice Brett Kavanaugh. Lorenzo is an important case that raises fundamental interpretative questions about the reach of federal securities statutes. But most significant is its unique procedural posture: when the Supreme Court issues its decision on Lorenzo in 2019, Justice Kavanaugh will be recused while the other eight Justices rule on a lower court opinion from the D.C. Circuit in which he wrote …

American Usury Law And The Military Lending Act, Paul Kantwill, Christopher L. Peterson

Utah Law Faculty Scholarship

In 2006 Congress adopted the Military Lending Act (“MLA”) to protect active duty military service members and their families from high-cost, predatory loans. The core provision of the statute is a usury limit capping interest rates at no more than 36 percent per annum. The United States Department of Defense finalized regulations implementing the MLA in 2007 and then later issued substantially revised regulations in 2015. The MLA is America’s first modern, national usury law that is applicable to all types of creditors and was adopted after the evolution of our national credit card market. After over a decade, the …

Has Regulation Affected The High Frequency Trading Market?, Kevin O'Connell

Catholic University Journal of Law and Technology

As technology rapidly advances society, there are a few industries that have not been drastically impacted by disruptive technology. The financial markets are no different. Over the past ten years, algorithmic trading has quickly revolutionized the financial markets and continues to dominate an industry that for many years remained largely uninfluenced by society’s technological advances. Algorithmic trading is “a type of trading done with the use of mathematical formulas” and market data “run by powerful computers” to execute trades. One of the most commonly used platforms of algorithmic trading is high frequency trading. High frequency trading (“HFT”) uses a computerized …

Beyond Bankruptcy: Resolution As A Macroprudential Regulatory Tool, Steven L. Schwarcz

Notre Dame Law Review

Postcrisis efforts to extend bankruptcy-resolution techniques to protect the stability of the financial system have been insufficient, in part because regulators have been conflating bankruptcy’s traditional goals of resolving troubled firms individually with the need to resolve critical elements of the financial system to ensure its continued operation as a “system.” This requires resolving troubled firms collectively, as well as resolving securities-trading markets and the infrastructure that serves to facilitate that trading. The Article examines how to design that regulation, differentiating three approaches: reactive regulation, which comprises variations on traditional bankruptcy; proactive regulation, which consists of preplanned enhancements that are …

The Return Of Deregulation And Trickle-Down Economics In The Age Of Trump: Why The Efficient Market Hypothesis Refuses To Die And The Implications For U.S. Economic Policy At Large, 5 J. Marshall Global Mkt. L.J. 1 (2019), Matthew Glass

John Marshall Global Markets Law Journal

The 2008 market collapse created economic devastation not seen in the United States since the Great Depression. More than a decade later, the reappearance of a fiscal agenda rooted in deregulation and trickle-down economics risks a return to the boom and bust cycles that have unfailingly wrought great economic pain on the American people. The ever-increasing inequality gap between the rich and poor is particularly concerning.

Should Cryptocurrencies And Initial Coin Offerings (Icos) Be Regulated Under Australian Financial Services Laws?, 5 J. Marshall Global Mkt. L.J. 27 (2019), Daniela Lai

John Marshall Global Markets Law Journal

The rise of the popularity of cryptocurrencies in the last few years has sparked international debate as to the characterization of cryptocurrencies and tokens issued by ICOs. The decentralized nature of cryptocurrencies and ICOs raises fundamental challenges as to the parties and tokens that should be regulated and how they should be regulated. This Article proposes that tokens which are similar to securities should be regulated like securities. Under Australian law, this Article proposes that digital currencies should be categorized as financial products with the exception of utility tokens. Entities issuing ICOs and cryptocurrency exchanges should be subject to disclosure …

Replacing Libor: Dangerous Improvisation, 5 J. Marshall Global Mkt. L.J. 49 (2019), Karl Muth

John Marshall Global Markets Law Journal

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Cross-Border Scope Of Private Cause Of Action Under The Commodity Exchange Act, 5 J. Marshall Global Mkt. L.J. 58 (2019), Alina Petrova

John Marshall Global Markets Law Journal

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Can “Imfcoin” Be Scaruffi's Moneta Immaginaria?, Alexander M. Heideman

Marquette Intellectual Property Law Review

Cryptocurrencies have taken the world by storm. But these decentralized and unregulated digital fiat currencies have more in common with the currencies of ages past than many believe. These commonalities may result in the incorporation of new cryptocurrencies into older institutions. One such institution is the International Monetary Fund's Special Drawing Rights (SDRs), which has bene relegated to an afterthought in the international monetary system since the Nixon Shock in 1971. The Fund's Managing Director recently made comments that indicated that the Fund is exploring the incorporation of a cryptocurrency into the framework of the SDR, a change which China …

Nefarious Neighbors: How Living Near Payday Loan Stores Affects Loan Use, Nathalie Martin, Younghee Lim, Aimee Moles, Trey Bickham

Faculty Scholarship

Few of us give much thought to local laws, yet local laws, such as zoning and other land use regulations, have an abiding influence on our lives. Think for a few moments about the types of businesses located near your home. Are these businesses places you frequent? Considering socio-economics, how do land uses differ from locale to locale throughout your city or state? Do all citizens have an equal voice in the land use approval process? The answer is likely no, which creates environmental and economic justice issues.

Like all businesses, when it comes to payday lenders, geography matters. Payday …

Crouching Tigers And Hidden Dragons On The Great Wall Street: Decoding The Corporate Goverance Of Chinese Commercial Banks, Yueh-Ping (Alex) Yang

Washington International Law Journal

As China’s economic influence on the world grows, its system of state capitalism is likewise receiving increasing scrutiny. Behind the state capitalism, China’s banking sector, the “Great Wall Street”—parallel to the “Wall Street” in the United States—plays a fundamental role in financing and supporting China’s economy. Contemporary studies of China’s state capitalism, however, focus mainly on Chinese state-owned enterprises, leaving less attention specific to China’s state-owned banking sector which adopts a rather different corporate governance practice. In this paper, I conduct a comprehensive and critical review of the bank governance practice in China. Statutorily, Chinese commercial banks generally follow corporate …

The Next Global Disruptive Innovation: Can Mobile Money Make The Journey Upmarket To Disrupt The Financial Services Industry?, David Myerson

Northwestern Journal of International Law & Business

No abstract provided.

U.S. Tax Reform: Considerations For Service Members [Notes], Kan Samuel

Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Multilateral Development Banks, Their Member States And Public Accountability: A Proposal, Daniel D. Bradlow

Scholarly Articles in Law Reviews & Journals

More than 25 years ago the multilateral development banks (MDBs) began establishing independent accountability mechanisms (IAMs), such as the World Bank’s Inspection Panel, to address concerns about MDB accountability to those communities and groups who were harmed by their decisions and actions. This essay argues that these mechanisms need updating. In the interests of promoting new and creative thinking about these mechanisms, it makes an ambitious two-part proposal designed to improve the efficacy of the IAMs, while also respecting the sovereignty of their member states and protecting an appropriate level of immunity for the MDBs. First, the MDBs should jointly …