Posted on 15th Jun 2012 @ 1:25 PM

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau and the four prudential regulators have signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) that clarifies how the agencies will coordinate their supervisory activities, consistent with the Dodd-Frank Act.

Section 1025 of Dodd-Frank requires that agencies coordinate their supervision of insured depository institutions with more than $10 billion in assets and their affiliates. Such coordination includes scheduling examinations, conducting simultaneous examinations of covered depository institutions unless an institution requests separate examinations, and sharing draft reports of examination for comment.

The MOU is intended to establish arrangements for coordination and cooperation between the CFPB and the prudential regulators, minimize unnecessary regulatory burden, avoid unnecessary duplication of effort, and decrease the risk of conflicting supervisory directives.

Under the MOU, the agencies will coordinate examinations and other supervisory activities and share certain material supervisory information concerning:

• Compliance with federal consumer financial laws and certain other federal laws that regulate consumer financial products and services;
• Consumer compliance risk management programs;
• Activities such as underwriting, sales, marketing, servicing, collections, if they are related to consumer financial products or services; and
• Other related matters that the agencies may mutually agree upon.

Note for smaller depositories: The MOU does not address coordination regarding the CFPB’s authority under Dodd-Frank section 1026 to include examiners on a sampling basis for the
prudential regulators’ examinations of insured depository institutions with total assets of $10 billion or less for compliance with federal consumer financial laws. The agencies said they are considering memorializing any arrangements related to the CFPB’s section 1026 authorities in another agreement.

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