[Congressional Record Volume 160, Number 8 (Tuesday, January 14, 2014)]
[House]
[Pages H196-H198]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
HOLDING COMPANY REGISTRATION THRESHOLD EQUALIZATION ACT OF 2013
Mr. GARRETT. Madam Speaker, I move to suspend the rules and pass the
bill (H.R. 801) to amend the Securities Exchange Act of 1934 to make
the shareholder threshold for registration of savings and loan holding
companies the same as for bank holding companies.
The Clerk read the title of the bill.
The text of the bill is as follows:
H.R. 801
Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of
the United States of America in Congress assembled,
SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.
This Act may be cited as the ``Holding Company Registration
Threshold Equalization Act of 2013''.
SEC. 2. REGISTRATION THRESHOLD FOR SAVINGS AND LOAN HOLDING
COMPANIES.
The Securities Exchange Act of 1934 (15 U.S.C. 78a et seq.)
is amended--
(1) in section 12(g)--
(A) in paragraph (1)(B), by inserting after ``is a bank''
the following: ``, a savings and loan holding company (as
defined in section 10 of the Home Owners' Loan Act),''; and
(B) in paragraph (4), by inserting after ``case of a bank''
the following: ``, a savings and loan holding company (as
defined in section 10 of the Home Owners' Loan Act),''; and
(2) in section 15(d), by striking ``case of bank'' and
inserting the following: ``case of a bank, a savings and loan
holding company (as defined in section 10 of the Home Owners'
Loan Act),''.
The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mrs. Wagner). Pursuant to the rule, the
gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Garrett) and the gentleman from
Connecticut (Mr. Himes) each will control 20 minutes.
The Chair recognizes the gentleman from New Jersey.
General Leave
Mr. GARRETT. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members
may have 5 legislative days within which to revise and extend their
remarks and submit extraneous materials for the Record on H.R. 801,
currently under consideration.
Mr. GARRETT. Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may
consume.
I rise today, as I did a moment ago as well, in support of this good,
commonsense legislation, which is H.R. 801, the Holding Company
Registration Threshold Equalization Act. I also, just like with the
prior legislation, would like to commend the bipartisan nature of the
legislation before us and the bipartisan nature of the sponsors of this
legislation, Representatives Womack, Himes, Delaney, and Mrs. Wagner,
as well, for their outstanding work on getting this important measure
to the floor today.
What does it do?
H.R. 801 basically corrects a technical oversight from last Congress'
JOBS Act, which was the Jumpstart Our Business Startups Act, and it
does so by ensuring that savings and loans holding companies, or SLHCs,
are able to take advantage of the law's provisions that modify the
thresholds by which bank holding companies are forced to register or
allowed to deregister with the SEC.
Most savings and loan holding companies are organized very similarly
to bank holding companies and are subject to similar regulatory
oversight. Because this is the case, it is appropriate now for us to
correct this technical oversight in the law and streamline the
registration and deregistration thresholds of savings and loan and bank
holding companies.
I will end now where I began, and that is to thank the leadership for
bringing up this very important legislation, and the sponsors as well
for working in a bipartisan manner. I ask that all Members support this
commonsense legislation and the Senate consider it without any delay.
With that, I reserve the balance of my time.
Mr. HIMES. Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
I, once again, thank Chairman Garrett, chairman of the Subcommittee
on Capital Markets, for his support and leadership on this bill. I
particularly thank my cosponsors on this bill: Mr. Womack, with whom I
have worked before; Mrs. Wagner; and Mr. Delaney. Additional cosponsors
of the bill are Mr. Polis, Mr. Quigley, and Mr. Renacci. I thank them
for their hard work.
This is a rare example of a wise bipartisan bill that will achieve
something important, which is to basically undertake a technical fix to
the JOBS Act, passed into law in April of 2012, which allowed banks to
put off becoming public until they reached a threshold of 2,000
shareholders. That sounds like a small and technical point, but it put
a tremendous burden on banks that perhaps were not ready to go public
with more than 500 shareholders at the time.
The legislation did not directly specify that savings and loans would
also receive the same treatment. It was, I believe, the intent of
Congress that that be the case. So H.R. 801 goes back to seek to remedy
this issue.
The Holding Company Registration Threshold Equalization Act, a rather
awkward name for H.R. 801, extends the shareholder registration
thresholds to savings and loan holding companies. This bill will ensure
that savings and loan institutions operate under the same rules as
banks, trying to create a more uniform and simple regulatory apparatus.
This will help these institutions raise capital so that they have the
resources to make the loans which drive the economic growth--the
businesses, the colleges, the mortgages, the purchases that drive the
economic growth of this country.
Madam Speaker, again, I thank Mr. Garrett for his support. As we seek
creative solutions to the Nation's job crisis, we should do everything
we can to stimulate the consumer demand that we know drives so much of
this economy. This bill is one small, commonsense step we can take in
that direction.
Again, I thank Mr. Womack, Mrs. Wagner, and Mr. Delaney for their
leadership.
With that, I reserve the balance of my time.
Mr. GARRETT. I, too, thank the gentleman from Connecticut.
Madam Speaker, I yield such time as he may consume to the gentleman
from Arkansas (Mr. Womack), the prime sponsor of the bill.
Mr. WOMACK. Madam Speaker, my thanks to the subcommittee chairman and
to Chairman Hensarling for shepherding this bill through committee and
bringing it to the House floor. I, too, would like to express my
gratitude to my colleagues on both sides of the aisle, particularly
Representative Himes, with whom I worked in the previous Congress on
similar legislation that has already been articulated, and
Representative Delaney and Mrs. Wagner for working with me on this
bipartisan measure.
As you know, Madam Speaker, we have been talking about jobs. The
House has passed bill after bill to create a better environment for
private sector growth and job creation. These conservative solutions
would help create new jobs today, would make life for families better
across the country, and would expand opportunity for everyone without
expanding government. That is
[[Page H197]]
exactly what this bill, H.R. 801, does as well, and I am proud to rise
and urge support for its passage.
Small financial institutions are essential to the communities they
serve. Their boards are made up of community leaders. Their employees
are our neighbors. They sponsor Little League teams and softball
leagues and support the United Way. On Friday nights, you see their
logos on the scoreboards at high school football games.
These institutions have a deep and abiding love for the towns that
they serve, and our constituents--small business owners, farmers, and
hardworking Americans--rely on them to meet payroll, to purchase
equipment, or to buy a car or a home.
Unfortunately, these institutions are coming under increased pressure
from Washington, forcing them to spend more and more of their resources
not to put capital into the community but to comply with onerous new
regulations and requirements--requirements intended for larger banks--
instead of serving the needs of their communities. Our small community
banks and savings and loan holding companies were not the cause of the
financial crisis, and they should not be treated as though they were.
That is why in the last Congress the House and Senate acted to
eliminate some of these unnecessary burdens by passing the JOBS Act.
Among other things, the bill raised the registration threshold for bank
holdings companies from 500 to 2,000 shareholders and increased the
deregistration threshold from 300 to 1,200 shareholders, better
positioning banks to increase their business lending and, in turn,
promote economic growth in our communities.
Due to an oversight, the JOBS Act did not explicitly extend these new
thresholds to savings and loan holding companies. As a sponsor of the
original legislation, this wasn't our intent, and I supported report
language in the House FY 2013 Financial Services and General Government
appropriations bill clarifying that savings and loan holding companies
should be treated in the same manner as bank and bank holding
companies. Additionally, Representative Himes and I wrote to SEC
Chairman Schapiro to ask that the SEC use its authority to carry out
our original intent.
Unfortunately, Madam Speaker, we are still without a successful
resolution to the problem. At a time when our economy is struggling,
Congress must address the issue and ease the burdens on these
institutions to allow them to deploy more of their capital throughout
the communities they serve. H.R. 801 does this by correcting this
oversight and ensuring that savings and loan holding companies are
treated in the same manner as bank and bank holding companies.
I urge my colleagues to support this job-creating legislation.
Mr. HIMES. Madam Speaker, it is my pleasure to yield 2 minutes to the
gentleman from Illinois (Mr. Schneider), my colleague.
Mr. SCHNEIDER. Mr. Speaker, I rise today in support of H.R. 801, the
Holding Company Registration Threshold Equalization Act. This simple,
bipartisan measure ensures consumers and businesses--the drivers of our
economy--have access to the capital they need.
The JOBS Act gave small community banks flexibility to raise capital
without being required to comply with regulations specifically intended
for the larger financial institutions that were responsible for the
2008 financial crisis. This was a positive change that injected much-
needed capital into our local economies. However, the legislation did
not specifically extend it to small savings and loans holding
companies.
It is important that we now put the savings and loans on par with our
banks, retaining the equity and diversity conducive to the health of
our banking system. By putting additional capital in the hands of our
local savings and loans, we are helping consumers who are looking for
home loans, our neighbors who are starting small businesses, and small
businesses that are continuing to invest in their future.
This may be a technical correction, but it remains a correction that
has significant beneficial implications for our communities and for our
continued economic recovery.
I ask my colleagues to join me in support of this measure.
Mr. GARRETT. Mr. Speaker, at this time I yield such time as she may
consume to the gentlewoman from Missouri (Mrs. Wagner), also a prime
sponsor of the legislation before us and a leading and active member on
the committee.
Mrs. WAGNER. Mr. Speaker, I want to thank the sponsor of this
legislation, Mr. Womack of Arkansas, as well as my Democrat colleagues,
Mr. Himes of Connecticut and Mr. Delaney of Maryland, for their work on
this important issue. I also want to thank the chairman of the
subcommittee for his very hard work in getting this bill to the floor
today.
Mr. Speaker, the JOBS Act was a big win for the American economy.
Since the law was passed a year and a half ago, a number of American
businesses, including more than 40 biotechnology companies, as well as
companies such as Kayak and Twitter, have gone public using provisions
of the JOBS Act.
Additionally, dozens of community banks across the country have
already taken advantage of the updated SEC registration thresholds
which made up title VI of the JOBS Act.
Perhaps most encouraging is the frenzy of activity we have been
seeing from entrepreneurs around the country, whether it is small
technology startups lining up at the gate to begin crowdfunding or
small businesses being able to share their story with more investors,
now that they are allowed to advertise. We certainly see this kind of
activity in the greater St. Louis region, which has become a major hub
of innovation.
{time} 1315
This is exactly what the JOBS Act was intended to do: allow
entrepreneurs and small businesses to focus on innovating and creating
jobs, not only complying with outdated government regulations.
Unfortunately, as we all know, Washington tends to move a little
slower than the private sector, which is why this legislation is
necessary. Title VI of the JOBS Act updates outdated SEC registration
thresholds for community banks, and it will allow banks to focus more
time on serving their customers than on complying with unnecessary red
tape. And while Congress intended to include savings and loans as a
part of these new registration thresholds, the SEC, to date, has not
interpreted the law in this way.
Savings and loans perform essentially the same function as banks.
They are overseen by the same regulators and are a pillar of many small
towns and communities across this country.
Missouri is home to about 20 savings and loans that could one day
benefit from the provisions in title VI. Many of them have under $200
million in assets and are located in rural areas that rely on their
savings and loans for credit. Increasing the ability of these
institutions to lend will help increase economic activity in Missouri
and all around our great country.
In order to put savings and loans on equal footing with community
banks and to codify congressional intent, today we are considering H.R.
801, which will extend the updated threshold in the JOBS Act to savings
and loans. I am pleased to be a cosponsor of this legislation, because
Congress must continue to take steps, no matter how incremental, to
increase lending and investment in our economy.
As an added bonus, this legislation comes to the floor today with
strong bipartisan support, and I want to again thank my colleagues on
both sides of the aisle for their work and their support on this issue,
Mr. Speaker.
I urge passage of the bill.
Mr. HIMES. Mr. Speaker, I would like to just close by thanking you
for our partnership and our work on this bill. I hope we can do more of
the same.
I thank Mrs. Wagner and Mr. Delaney, cosponsors of this bill, and
Chairman Garrett for pushing this through.
As we have said, H.R. 801 is a good idea, a bipartisan idea, and
something that I hope we can see the Senate take up.
Mr. Speaker, I urge support of H.R. 801 and yield back the balance of
my time.
Mr. GARRETT. Mr. Speaker, I was just thinking as I was sitting here.
[[Page H198]]
Speaker Boehner raised the question at the beginning of this
administration, where are the jobs? And it is a question that I
continue to get when I go home to my district, where are the jobs after
all the years of this administration? And it is a question that I hear
on the floor once in a while from Members who don't really follow the
activity on the floor closely, where are the bills to help create jobs,
as if we are not moving them.
Well, today, Mr. Speaker, we have moved two more to the laundry list
of other legislation out of this House to answer the question, how can
we help facilitate and create more jobs for the American public? That
is why I am so pleased to be here with the sponsors of this legislation
in a bipartisan manner, H.R. 801, and to be able to get this through
the House to answer the question, where are the jobs?
Well, the House of Representatives continues in its tradition of
passing legislation to answer that question, to make more jobs for the
American public, to streamline the regulatory process, and to reduce
the number of Americans who are no longer in the workforce whatsoever.
So I encourage my colleagues on both sides of the aisle to not only
pass the legislation today, but also to encourage the U.S. Senate,
where some often say all good bills go to die, to pick up this
legislation and pass it in a forthright manner.
Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.
The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Womack). The question is on the motion
offered by the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Garrett) that the House
suspend the rules and pass the bill, H.R. 801.
The question was taken.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. In the opinion of the Chair, two-thirds
being in the affirmative, the ayes have it.
Mr. GARRETT. Mr. Speaker, on that I demand the yeas and nays.
The yeas and nays were ordered.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Pursuant to clause 8 of rule XX, further
proceedings on this motion will be postponed.
____________________