[Federal Register Volume 83, Number 222 (Friday, November 16, 2018)]
[Proposed Rules]
[Pages 58118-58121]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: 2018-24167]



[[Page 58117]]

Vol. 83

Friday,

No. 222

November 16, 2018

Part XXII





Bureau of Consumer Financial Protection





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Semiannual Regulatory Agenda

  Federal Register / Vol. 83 , No. 222 / Friday, November 16, 2018 / 
Unified Agenda  

[[Page 58118]]


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BUREAU OF CONSUMER FINANCIAL PROTECTION

12 CFR CH. X


Semiannual Regulatory Agenda

AGENCY: Bureau of Consumer Financial Protection.

ACTION: Semiannual regulatory agenda.

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SUMMARY: The Bureau of Consumer Financial Protection (Bureau) is 
publishing this agenda as part of the Fall 2018 Unified Agenda of 
Federal Regulatory and Deregulatory Actions. The Bureau reasonably 
anticipates having the regulatory matters identified below under 
consideration during the period from October 1, 2018 to September 30, 
2019. The next agenda will be published in spring 2019 and will update 
this agenda through spring 2020. Publication of this agenda is in 
accordance with the Regulatory Flexibility Act (5 U.S.C. 601 et seq.).

DATES: This information is current as of August 30, 2018.

ADDRESSES: Bureau of Consumer Financial Protection, 1700 G Street NW, 
Washington, DC 20552.

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: A staff contact is included for each 
regulatory item listed herein. If you require this document in an 
alternative electronic format, please contact 
[email protected].

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: The Bureau is publishing its Fall 2018 
Agenda as part of the Fall 2018 Unified Agenda of Federal Regulatory 
and Deregulatory Actions, which is coordinated by the Office of 
Management and Budget under Executive Order 12866. The agenda lists the 
regulatory matters that the Bureau reasonably anticipates having under 
consideration during the period from October 1, 2018 to September 30, 
2019, as described further below.\1\ The Bureau's participation in the 
Unified Agenda is voluntary. The complete Unified Agenda is available 
to the public at the following website: http://www.reginfo.gov.
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    \1\ The listing does not include certain routine, frequent, or 
administrative matters. Further, certain of the information fields 
for the listing are not applicable to independent regulatory 
agencies, including the Bureau, and, accordingly, the Bureau has 
indicated responses of ``no'' for such fields.
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    Pursuant to the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer 
Protection Act, Public Law 111-203, 124 Stat. 1376 (Dodd-Frank Act), 
the Bureau has rulemaking, supervisory, enforcement, and other 
authorities relating to consumer financial products and services. These 
authorities include the authority to issue regulations under more than 
a dozen Federal consumer financial laws, which transferred to the 
Bureau from seven Federal agencies on July 21, 2011. The Bureau's 
general purpose, as specified in section 1021 of the Dodd-Frank Act, is 
to implement and enforce Federal consumer financial law consistently 
for the purpose of ensuring that all consumers have access to markets 
for consumer financial products and services and that markets for 
consumer financial products and services are fair, transparent, and 
competitive.
    The Bureau is working on various initiatives to address issues in 
markets for consumer financial products and services that are not 
reflected in this notice because the Unified Agenda is limited to 
rulemaking activities. Section 1021 of the Dodd-Frank Act specifies the 
objectives of the Bureau, including ensuring that, with respect to 
consumer financial products and services, consumers are provided with 
timely and understandable information to make responsible decisions 
about financial transactions; consumers are protected from unfair, 
deceptive, or abusive acts and practices and from discrimination; 
outdated, unnecessary, or unduly burdensome regulations are regularly 
identified and addressed in order to reduce unwarranted regulatory 
burdens; that Federal consumer financial law is enforced consistently, 
without regard to the status of a person as a depository institution, 
in order to promote fair competition; and markets for consumer 
financial products and services operate transparently and efficiently 
to facilitate access and innovation.
    The Bureau is under interim leadership pending the confirmation of 
a permanent director. The Bureau is also in the process of implementing 
various provisions in the Economic Growth, Regulatory Relief, and 
Consumer Protection Act (EGRRCPA), Public Law 115-174, 132 Stat. 1297, 
which was signed into law in May 2018, and of conducting its first 
assessments of the effectiveness of prior ``significant'' Bureau 
rulemakings as required by section 1022(d) of the Dodd-Frank Act. In 
addition, the Bureau is analyzing more than 86,000 comments received in 
response to its ``Call for Evidence'' initiative seeking feedback on 
Bureau operations and regulations. The comment period for the last of 
that initiative's twelve Requests for Information closed in July 2018.
    This Agenda largely focuses on the continuation of projects from 
the Spring 2018 Agenda and the addition of rulemakings to implement 
EGRRCPA requirements. The Bureau is carefully considering the feedback 
received through the Call for Evidence, prior Requests for Information 
released in conjunction with the section 1022(d) assessments, and other 
sources in setting its future priorities. Following this consideration, 
the Bureau expects to refine its priorities no later than the Spring 
2019 Agenda and will publish a statement of priorities at that time.

Implementing Statutory Directives

    Much of the Bureau's rulemaking work is focusing on implementing 
directives mandated in the EGRRCPA, the Dodd-Frank Act, and other 
statutes. As part of these rulemakings, the Bureau is working to 
achieve the consumer protection objectives of the statutes while 
minimizing regulatory burden on financial services providers, including 
facilitating industry compliance with rules.
    For example, the Bureau issued two rules to facilitate the 
implementation of the EGRRCPA. The first was an interim final rule that 
adjusts certain model forms under the Fair Credit Reporting Act in 
light of EGRRCPA amendments to strengthen consumers' ability to protect 
themselves from identity theft. To reduce compliance costs and 
disruption in light of the September 21, 2018 effective date of this 
amendment, the rule provides various options for amending the affected 
disclosures to inform consumers that the EGRRCPA created a right to 
obtain a free ``security freeze'' from nationwide consumer reporting 
agencies and extended the length of ``fraud alerts'' that consumers may 
place on their files with nationwide consumer reporting agencies from 
90 days to one year. The interim final rule takes effect on September 
21, 2018, but the Bureau is seeking comment on the changes and 
underlying disclosures.
    The second issuance in August 2018 was an interpretive and 
procedural rule that provides clarification regarding EGRRCPA 
amendments to the Home Mortgage Disclosure Act (HMDA), which requires 
financial institutions to report certain mortgage information to 
federal financial regulators and the public. The scope of HMDA 
reporting was expanded by the Dodd-Frank Act and by the Bureau via rule 
in 2015. The EGRRCPA creates a partial exemption to allow certain 
insured depository institutions and insured credit unions not to report 
certain data points for certain transactions. The August 2018 
interpretive and procedural rule provides clarification as to which 
loans and lines of credit count toward the EGRRCPA exemption thresholds 
and which data points are covered by the partial exemptions. As 
indicated in the

[[Page 58119]]

rule and discussed further below, the Bureau anticipates commencing an 
additional notice-and-comment rulemaking in spring 2019 to incorporate 
the August interpretations and procedures into Regulation C, further 
implement the EGRRCPA amendments to HMDA, and conduct the Bureau's own 
reconsideration of the 2015 HMDA rule.
    The Bureau has also added three additional EGRRCPA projects to the 
agenda, in addition to engaging in a range of other non-rulemaking 
activities to reflect the statute's passage and to provide guidance to 
industry on implementation issues. The first two projects reflect 
directives in sections 108 and 307 of EGRRCPA that require the Bureau 
to engage in rulemakings to (1) exempt certain creditors with assets of 
$10 billion or less from certain mortgage escrow requirements under the 
Dodd-Frank Act; and (2) develop standards for assessing consumers' 
ability to repay ``Property Assessed Clean Energy'' financing (PACE), 
which results in a tax assessment on a consumer's home and covers the 
costs of home improvements, often to increase energy efficiency. The 
third project contemplates that notice-and-comment rulemaking may be 
helpful to implement or clarify other provisions of EGRRCPA that do not 
require Bureau rulemaking to take effect,\2\ particularly with regard 
to various provisions that address mortgage requirements under the 
Dodd-Frank Act and its implementing regulations.
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    \2\ See, e.g., Economic Growth, Regulatory Relief, and Consumer 
Protection Act, Public Law 115-174, 132 Stat. 1296, Sec. Sec.  101, 
104, 106, 107, 109(a), 301, 601 (2018).''
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    The Bureau has also added a new rulemaking to its agenda to 
facilitate further implementation of a statutory directive in the 2010 
Dodd-Frank Act amendments to HMDA that the Bureau modify or require 
modification of the public HMDA data for the purpose of protecting 
consumer privacy interests. In the 2015 final rule to implement the 
Dodd-Frank Act amendments, the Bureau adopted a balancing test to 
determine whether and how HMDA data should be modified prior to its 
disclosure to the public in order to protect applicant and borrower 
privacy while also fulfilling HMDA's public disclosure purpose. The 
Bureau sought comment in 2017 on its proposed application of the 
balancing test to the 2018 data to be collected and reported by 
lenders, and expects to issue final guidance in the next few months to 
govern the disclosure of the 2018 data. After consideration of 
stakeholder comments urging that determinations concerning the 
disclosure of loan-level HMDA data be effectuated through more formal 
processes, the Bureau has decided to add the new notice-and-comment 
rulemaking to govern the disclosure of HMDA data in future years.
    In light of the need to focus additional resources on various HMDA 
initiatives discussed elsewhere in this agenda, the Bureau has adjusted 
its timeline for implementing an additional statutory directive 
contained in section 1071 of the Dodd-Frank Act. Section 1071 amended 
the Equal Credit Opportunity Act (ECOA) to require financial 
institutions to collect, report, and make public certain information 
concerning credit applications made by women-owned, minority-owned, and 
small businesses. The Bureau delayed implementation of this provision 
pending implementation of the Dodd-Frank Act amendments to HMDA, which 
creates a similar regime for mortgages, and then accelerated work on 
the project after the HMDA rules were issued in 2015. In light of 
current resource constraints and priority accorded to HMDA 
implementation, the Bureau has now reclassified the section 1071 
project from pre-rule status to longer-term action status. The Bureau 
intends to continue certain market monitoring and research activities 
to facilitate resumption of the rulemaking.

Continuation of Other Rulemakings

    The Bureau is continuing certain other rulemakings described in its 
Spring 2018 Agenda to ensure that markets for consumer financial 
products and services operate transparently and efficiently and to 
address potential unwarranted regulatory burdens.
    For example, the Bureau announced in January 2018 that it intends 
to engage in a rulemaking to reconsider a 2017 rule titled Payday, 
Vehicle Title, and Certain High-Cost Installment Loans. The rule has a 
compliance date in August 2019. The Bureau expects to issue a Notice of 
Proposed Rulemaking by no later than early 2019 that will address 
reconsideration of the rule on the merits as well as address changes to 
its compliance date.
    In addition, prior to the enactment of the EGRRCPA, the Bureau had 
already taken action in August 2017 to temporarily increase the 
threshold for collecting and reporting HMDA data with respect to open-
end lines of credit so that the Bureau could assess whether to make a 
permanent adjustment to that threshold. In December 2017, the Bureau 
announced that it intended to open a rulemaking to reconsider its 2015 
HMDA rule more generally, for instance by potentially revisiting such 
issues as the institutional and transactional coverage tests and the 
rule's discretionary data points. In addition, as noted above, the 
Bureau anticipates engaging in notice-and-comment rulemaking to 
incorporate the EGRRCPA interpretative and procedural rule issued in 
August 2018 into Regulation C and to further implement the Act. The 
Bureau is considering these various HMDA projects in conjunction with 
each other and expects to issue a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking in 
spring 2019 to address some or all of the issues related to them.
    Finally, the Bureau has continued to engage in research and pre-
rulemaking activities regarding the debt collection market, which 
remains a top source of complaints to the Bureau. The Bureau has also 
received encouragement from industry and consumer groups to engage in 
rulemaking to address how to apply the 40-year old Fair Debt Collection 
Practices Act (FDCPA) to modern collection practices. The Bureau 
released an outline of proposals under consideration in July 2016 
concerning practices by companies that are debt collectors under the 
FDCPA. This outline was released in advance of convening a panel in 
August 2016 under the Small Business Regulatory Enforcement Fairness 
Act in conjunction with the Office of Management and Budget and the 
Small Business Administration's Chief Counsel for Advocacy to consult 
with representatives of small businesses that might be affected by the 
rulemaking. The Bureau expects to issue a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking 
addressing such issues as communication practices and consumer 
disclosures by spring 2019.

Further Planning

    As noted above, the Bureau has a number of workstreams underway 
that could affect planning and prioritization of rulemaking activity, 
as well as the way in which it conducts rulemakings and related 
processes. First, by January 2019, the Bureau will have completed three 
assessments prior ``significant'' Bureau rulemakings. These are the 
first assessments the Bureau has conducted to comply with section 
1022(d) of the Dodd-Frank Act. These assessments focus on rules that 
the Bureau issued to implement Dodd-Frank Act requirements concerning 
international remittance transfers, the assessment of consumers' 
ability to repay mortgage loans, and mortgage servicing. The Bureau 
will consider the results of these assessments and stakeholder feedback 
on the rules in determining whether

[[Page 58120]]

additional rulemaking or other policy initiatives are warranted. The 
Bureau also expects to begin work in 2019 on an assessment of its rules 
implementing a Dodd-Frank Act mandate to consolidate various mortgage 
origination disclosures under the Truth in Lending Act and Real Estate 
Settlement Procedures Act.
    In addition, as noted above, the Bureau issued twelve Requests for 
Information in 2018 seeking feedback on a wide variety of Bureau 
practices and procedures, as well as regulations that it had inherited 
from other agencies and issued under its own authority. The Bureau is 
assessing the suggestions for substantive rulemakings received in 
response to the RFIs along with suggestions from other sources, such as 
ideas gathered by an internal task force on burden reduction and 
projects that have previously been listed on the Bureau's agenda for 
potential rulemaking.\3\
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    \3\ In spring 2018, the Bureau reclassified certain projects 
that had previously been listed on the Bureau's active and longer-
term agenda as ``inactive'' pending a decision by the Bureau's next 
permanent director as to whether and when to proceed with the 
projects. The Bureau noted that the reclassification was not 
intended as a decision on the merits. The Bureau has made no further 
adjustments to the projects that were retained on the longer-term 
agenda for the Spring 2018 edition except to note where some 
projects have been reclassified as active rulemakings.
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    The Bureau is also considering future activity with regard to 
specific areas of consumer financial law of significant public 
interest. For example, the Bureau announced in May 2018 that it is 
reexamining the requirements of the Equal Credit Opportunity Act 
concerning the disparate impact doctrine in light of recent Supreme 
Court case law and the Congressional disapproval of a prior Bureau 
bulletin concerning indirect auto lender compliance with ECOA and its 
implementing regulations.\4\ The Bureau is also considering whether 
rulemaking or other activities may be helpful to further clarify the 
meaning of ``abusiveness'' under the section 1031 of the Dodd-Frank 
Act. Section 1031 and other provisions of the Dodd-Frank Act authorize 
the Bureau to take enforcement, supervision, and rulemaking action 
concerning unfair, deceptive, or abusive acts and practices. While 
statutory language, regulations, policy statements, and case law have 
provided important clarifications as to the meaning of unfairness and 
deception under federal consumer protection law over several decades, 
the Dodd-Frank Act was the first federal law to define and prohibit 
``abusive'' acts and practices with respect to consumer financial 
products and services generally.
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    \4\ https://www.consumerfinance.gov/about-us/newsroom/statement-bureau-consumer-financial-protection-enactment-sj-res-57/.
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    The Bureau is also considering refinements to the ways in which it 
conducts processes related to rulemakings, both in response to comments 
received in response to the Call for Evidence and other considerations. 
For example, the Bureau has decided to create an Office of Cost Benefit 
Analysis as part of an ongoing initiative to improve its analysis of 
the impacts of potential and adopted rules on consumers, financial 
services providers, and broader markets.\5\ The Bureau is also refining 
and expanding its processes for conducting retrospective reviews of 
regulations to identify and address potential unwarranted regulatory 
burdens on an ongoing basis.\6\
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    \5\ https://www.consumerfinance.gov/about-us/the-bureau/bureau-structure/.
    \6\ See, e.g., the Regulatory Flexibility Act, 5 U.S.C. 610 
(requiring agencies to review certain regulations within ten years 
after publication for purposes of minimizing their impacts on small 
businesses).
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    Finally, as required by the Dodd-Frank Act, the Bureau is 
continuing to monitor markets for consumer financial products and 
services to identify risks to consumers and the proper functioning of 
such markets. The Bureau expects by no later than the Spring 2019 
Agenda to issue a more comprehensive statement of priorities to reflect 
this market monitoring and the Bureau's other activities discussed 
above.

Kelly Thompson Cochran,
Assistant Director for Regulations, Bureau of Consumer Financial 
Protection.

         Consumer Financial Protection Bureau--Long-Term Actions
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                                                           Regulation
       Sequence No.                    Title             Identifier No.
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434.......................  Business Lending Data              3170-AA09
                             (Regulation B).
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CONSUMER FINANCIAL PROTECTION BUREAU (CFPB)

Long-Term Actions

434. Business Lending Data (Regulation B)

    E.O. 13771 Designation: Independent agency.
    Legal Authority: 15 U.S.C. 1691c-2
    Abstract: Section 1071 of the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and 
Consumer Protection Act (Dodd-Frank Act) amends the Equal Credit 
Opportunity Act (ECOA) to require financial institutions to report 
information concerning credit applications made by women-owned, 
minority-owned, and small businesses. The amendments to ECOA made by 
the Dodd-Frank Act require that certain data be collected, maintained, 
and reported, including the number of the application and date the 
application was received; the type and purpose of the loan or credit 
applied for; the amount of credit applied for and approved; the type of 
action taken with regard to each application and the date of such 
action; the census tract of the principal place of business; the gross 
annual revenue of the business; and the race, sex, and ethnicity of the 
principal owners of the business. The Dodd-Frank Act also provides 
authority for the Bureau to require any additional data that the Bureau 
determines would aid in fulfilling the purposes of this section. The 
Bureau issued a Request for Information in 2017 seeking public comment 
on, among other things, the types of credit products offered and the 
types of data currently collected by lenders in this market, and the 
potential complexity, cost of, and privacy issues related to, small 
business data collection. The information received will help the Bureau 
determine how to implement the rule efficiently while minimizing 
burdens on lenders. In light of other responsibilities, the Bureau has 
moved this rulemaking from pre-rule to long-term action status. The 
Bureau intends to continue certain market monitoring and research 
activities to facilitate resumption of the rulemaking.
    Timetable:

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               Action                    Date            FR Cite
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Request for Information.............   05/15/17  82 FR 22318

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Request for Information Comment        09/14/17  .......................
 Period End.
                                     -----------------------------------
Next action undetermined............           To Be Determined
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    Regulatory Flexibility Analysis Required: Yes.
    Agency Contact: Elena Grigera Babinecz, Office of Regulations, 
Consumer Financial Protection Bureau Phone: 202 435-7700.
    RIN: 3170-AA09

[FR Doc. 2018-24167 Filed 11-15-18; 8:45 am]
 BILLING CODE 4810-AM-P