President Trump has begun putting in place a new regulatory team for the banking industry, which his top advisers hope to leverage in their efforts to ease industry rules and make it easier for financial companies to lend money, The Washington Post reported yesterday. The Trump administration announced it would replace the head of one of the industry’s top regulators with banking lawyer Keith Noreika. A day earlier, Trump’s pick to lead the Securities and Exchange Commission, Jay Clayton, was confirmed by the Senate, and Trump is close to filling a vacant position at the Federal Reserve that could play a key role in easing industry regulations. For Trump, such appointments may be the most efficient way of fulfilling his promise to “dismantle” 2010’s Dodd-Frank Act. The House is considering legislation that includes many of the changes Wall Street wants, and the White House on Wednesday threw its support behind the legislation, known as the Financial Choice Act. The bill is “an important step forward on a key priority of this Administration: eliminating regulations that hold back the U.S. economy and stifle growth,” White House economic adviser Gary Cohn said. “The Dodd-Frank Act has created serious moral hazard in our markets and worsened our too-big-to-fail problem.” By peppering the banking industry’s regulators with new leadership, some of the same goals can be reached more quickly.
