By Alison Vekshin and Peter Cook (Bloomberg via BusinessWeek)-- The Consumer Financial Protection Agency sought by President Barack Obama is an essential part of the regulatory overhaul being negotiated in Congress, House Financial Services Committee Chairman Barney Frank said.
The standalone agency, opposed by Republicans and banks including JPMorgan Chase & Co., is “very important to us” because existing regulators view consumer protection “as a second thought,” Frank said yesterday in a Bloomberg Television interview.
“The agency that has by far the most power assigned to it to protect consumers is the Federal Reserve, and they don’t do it very well,” said Frank, a Massachusetts Democrat who put the consumer agency in legislation the House approved in December.
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