A federal regulator plans to explain what it considers to be “abusive” practices by companies selling financial services, a move aimed at giving a clearer idea of what behavior would get companies into trouble under relatively new government enforcement powers, the Wall Street Journal reported. Mick Mulvaney, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau’s acting director, said on Monday that the bureau is working on a regulation defining how it views unfair, deceptive or abusive acts or practices, known as "UDAAP." Most of the CFPB’s enforcement actions involve such claims and the 2010 Dodd-Frank financial law, which created the CFPB and gave it broad enforcement powers. Companies have long complained that the CFPB’s UDAAP approach was overly broad and nuanced, making what would trigger an enforcement action less predictable.
