Financial Regulatory Forum

By Tom Brown
MIAMI, Aug 18 (Reuters) – The United States is building criminal cases against more than 150 American clients of Swiss bank UBS as part of a crackdown on tax evasion now made easier by a deal over access to secret account information. (more…)

By Kevin Drawbaugh

WASHINGTON, July 23 (Reuters) – The Obama administration wants to hang a new shingle over the U.S. Federal Reserve’s marble-columned door that says “systemic risk regulator.” But many lawmakers, from both parties, aren’t feeling very confident about the Fed. It’s an issue surrounding a central part of President Barack Obama’s plan to overhaul financial regulation and it prompted skeptical comments at a Senate hearing on Thursday. (more…)

By Mark Felsenthal and Alister Bull

WASHINGTON, July 21 (Reuters) – Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke on Tuesday said the outlook for the long-suffering U.S. economy appears to be improving and the U.S. central bank was carefully reviewing ways to withdraw its massive monetary policy stimulus when conditions permit.
But Bernanke cautioned that unemployment was likely to remain high into 2011, and he warned that this could sap fragile consumer confidence and potentially undermine what is expected to be a very gradual recovery. (more…)

    WASHINGTON, July 9 (Reuters) – Following is the full text of Federal
Reserve Vice Chairman Donald Kohn’s testimony delivered on Thursday before a
House Financial Services subscommittee hearing on systemic risk regulation: 
(more…)

   By Patrick Rucker
   WASHINGTON, July 9 (Reuters) – Many U.S. banks need to check their commercial real estate holdings more carefully and ensure that a continued decline in the property market does not threaten the lender, a Federal Reserve bank examiner said on Thursday.
(more…)

   By Steven C. Johnson
   NEW YORK, June 30 (Reuters) – Policy-makers must focus on how to treat systemically important firms that are seen as too big to fail, Thomas Hoenig, president of the Kansas City Federal Reserve Bank, said on Tuesday.
(more…)