{"id":4370,"date":"2019-01-09T21:52:38","date_gmt":"2019-01-10T02:52:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.paymentfacilitator.com\/?p=4370"},"modified":"2021-06-30T14:02:23","modified_gmt":"2021-06-30T14:02:23","slug":"opening-pandoras-regulatory-box-what-to-watch-for-in-2019","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/infinicept.com\/payment-facilitator\/business\/opening-pandoras-regulatory-box-what-to-watch-for-in-2019\/","title":{"rendered":"Opening Pandora\u2019s Regulatory Box: What to Watch for in 2019"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Dan Spalinger, Senior Consultant, Double Diamond Group and Rich Consulting<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Working in a regulatory-heavy environment can feel like being inside a washing machine at times, with the accurate forecasting of a 10-day hurricane plot. So where does fintech regulation stand at the beginning of a new year? In a state of flux as usual, it would seem.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

A year ago, many of us were coming off holiday dinners with\nrelatives who spent time bending our ears on the value of Bitcoin investing and\nthe benefits of distributed ledgers. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Today? Bitcoin\u2019s value has plummeted 75% from a year ago,\nand faith in businesses based around it has in many cases gone the way of pets.com.\nEvidently, flights to quality from recent stock market fluctuations didn\u2019t result\nin investments in Bitcoin as they did gold and other more traditional stores of\nvalue. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

This isn\u2019t to say that the technology behind it doesn\u2019t have\nvalue. From food labels to music distribution to government records,\nrecordkeeping processes across the globe are seeing the impact of the promised permanency\nand immutable nature of blockchain technology. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

When it comes to oversight of this cryptographic tool, New\nYork continues to be at the forefront in the U.S. Four years after the state introduced\nthe idea of a \u201cbitlicense,\u201d it now has taken another step forward by creating a\ntask force. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The group is empowered to inform the New York legislature\nand governor about the effects of digital currency on financial markets and the\nstate as well as the energy usage caused by cryptocurrency mining, while\nenhancing transparency and consumer protection. Its panel findings are due to\nbe submitted by December 2020. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Hopefully its roster of experts (to be composed of nine\nindividuals from various sectors that touch on blockchain technology) will be\nconsulted in the intervening period for its early findings, as two years is a\nlong time to wait in any technology space.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

On the federal agency front, a proposed name change over at\nthe Consumer Financial Protection Bureau resulted briefly in a new acronym for\nmany of us to learn and then to unlearn<\/a>\nin mid-December. Those of us not concerned with the not-inconsequential costs\nassociated with this rebranding have instead been wondering if that meant a\nchange in its regulatory and enforcement activity. The BCFP \u2013 sorry, CFPB \u2013 had\nalready been partially defanged with the arrival of the current administration.\nWas that trend continuing? <\/p>\n\n\n\n

For an agency seen as out of favor, it still brought a\nnumber of actions during 2018, including setting ceilings for Fair Credit\nReporting Act (FCRA) disclosure charges, fining banks for improperly reopening\naccounts and neglecting stop payment requests, going after mortgage debt relief\nlawyers and looking at the sometimes-cozy marketing relationships between some\ncolleges and depository institutions. Any thought of being able to fly under\nits radar should be heavily discounted. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Further, with the change in House leadership this past\nNovember has come emboldened rhetoric from congressional heavyweights such as Rep.\nMaxine Waters and Sen. Elizabeth Warren demanding that the agency reinvigorate\nits staff and oversight.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Of particular interest to fintech businesses is the further development\nof the CFPB\u2019s \u201csandbox.\u201d To date, the sandbox has been a lonely place, with\nonly a single entity participating and receiving a \u201cNo Action Letter\u201d from the\nCFPB (reducing in scope regulatory concerns during the development of a\nparticular product or service) since it introduced the program in 2012. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

But the decision-making process has been revamped, resulting\nin expedited timelines, a reduction in the information that must be shared with\nthe CFPB, and the provision of further regulatory protections. This may result\nin an increase in applicants and the support of additional innovations.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Whether the above examples touch upon your industry segment\nor sub-segment or not, they should serve as a reminder that political and\nregulatory bodies ought to be seen as an ever-opening Pandora\u2019s Box. They\nrequire close attention when creating and supporting the pillars and pathways\nthat make up our financial system\u2014no matter who is front and center on TV.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Working in a regulatory-heavy environment can feel like being inside a washing machine at times, with the accurate forecasting of a 10-day hurricane plot. So where does fintech regulation stand at the beginning of a new year? In a state of flux as usual, it would seem.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":21,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"content-type":"","_FSMCFIC_featured_image_caption":"","_FSMCFIC_featured_image_nocaption":"","_FSMCFIC_featured_image_hide":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[2,3,6,7,8],"tags":[101,104,161,205,289],"class_list":["post-4370","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-business","category-global","category-recent","category-risk-compliance","category-technology","tag-bitcoin","tag-blockchain","tag-cfpb","tag-cryptocurrency","tag-fcra"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/infinicept.com\/payment-facilitator\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4370","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/infinicept.com\/payment-facilitator\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/infinicept.com\/payment-facilitator\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/infinicept.com\/payment-facilitator\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/21"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/infinicept.com\/payment-facilitator\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4370"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/infinicept.com\/payment-facilitator\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4370\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7322,"href":"http:\/\/infinicept.com\/payment-facilitator\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4370\/revisions\/7322"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/infinicept.com\/payment-facilitator\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4370"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/infinicept.com\/payment-facilitator\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4370"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/infinicept.com\/payment-facilitator\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4370"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}