A plan by a top Republican lawmaker overseeing Wall Street banks would impose new strings and constraints on regulators, The Wall Street Journal reported yesterday. A summary plan of a bill by House Financial Services Committee Chairman Jeb Hensarling (R.-Texas) includes initiatives such as requiring the Federal Reserve to disclose the models used to test banks’ health yearly, curtailing policymakers’ authority to request a “living will” annually and dismantling their authority to curb Wall Street pay. Hensarling is expected to unveil the legislative text of his bill next week. The 18-page summary plan provides details of Hensarling’s proposal, including a litany of initiatives to kill core elements of the 2010 Dodd-Frank regulatory-overhaul law. It also provides greater detail on how banks can opt into an alternative regulatory regime that would free them from complying with the so-called Volcker rule, which attempts to bar them from betting with taxpayer-insured deposits, and from having banks show how they could go through a bankruptcy without a taxpayer bailout. Among the proposals contained in the plan include a repeal of the so-called Chevron doctrine, which requires courts to give deference to an agency’s interpretations under administrative law, opening the possibility of a greater number of legal challenges to the regulatory law passed six years ago.
