U.S. Stocks in Free Fall -800

https://prospect.org/economy/trump-s-assault-financial-reform/

Frank was not self-executing. Multiple regulatory agencies had to adopt hundreds of rules to turn the law into a reality. Each agency had to consider, propose, finalize, implement, interpret, and ultimately enforce each of those hundreds of rules.

By the time the Obama administration left office, over 300 rules had been finalized, according to one count. Even so, at least 115 Dodd-Frank rules remained to be completed when the Obama administration ended, including executive compensation rules, securities-based swap rules, credit rating agency reform, and commodity speculation rules.

Since taking office, the Trump administration has set about dismantling the core pillars of financial reform by:

· lowering capital requirements;

· weakening stress testing and living wills;

· allowing more proprietary trading;

· enabling more unregulated derivatives dealing;

· rolling back consumer and investor protections;

· reducing prudential regulation of systemically significant banks;

· neutering the regulation of systemically significant nonbanks and the shadow banking system;

· defunding research and monitoring of the financial industry; and 

· stopping enforcing the laws, if not actually siding with the predators.

While all are important, the deregulation of systemically significant nonbanks is worth singling out, because it illustrates the Trump administration's sheer recklessness. This will recreate the two-tier regulatory system that incentivizes and rewards regulatory arbitrage and a bailout culture. The implications for financial stability are immense.