Top Story Lending Related

HUD Secretary Castro has launched the “Prosperity Playbook” community tour in Kansas City, MO. The “Prosperity Playbook” will be a compilation of online resources written for and by state and local decision makers. The online toolkit will inform community planning and help local leaders think regionally about how to expand affordable housing opportunity and forge greater economic mobility in communities across the nation. The tour will continue with stops in Denver, San Francisco, Atlanta, and Minneapolis.

The Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA) has announced that the number of loans refinanced through the Home Affordable Refinance Program (HARP) through the fourth quarter 2015 totaled $3,380,558 since the inception of the program in 2009. FHFA estimates that as of third quarter 2015, more than 367,600 borrowers nationwide still have a financial incentive to refinance through HARP before the program expires in December 2016.

The minutes of the Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) meeting of January 26-27, 2016 have been released.

The Federal Reserve Board has issued a notification letter to firms participating in the upcoming Dodd-Frank Act Stress Test (DFAST) and Comprehensive Capital Analysis and Review (CCAR) of enhancements to certain aspects of the models used to estimate operational risk and capital.

The 2017 and 2018 HMDA file specifications have been posted by the CFPB.

The Federal Trade Commission has sent a summary of its 2015 work on debt collection practices to the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) for inclusion in the CFPB’s annual report to Congress on the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act (FDCPA), as required by the Dodd-Frank Act. The FTC and the CFPB share enforcement responsibilities under the FDCPA.

The Federal Emergency Management Agency has published [81 FR 7996] a final rule in today's Federal Register identifying communities in Alabama, Colorado, Indiana, Kansas, Massachusetts, Minnesota and Ohio where the sale of flood insurance has been authorized under the National Flood Insurance Program (NFIP) that are scheduled for suspension on March 16, 2016, for noncompliance with the floodplain management requirements of the program.

The NMLS has posted the agenda for the NMLS Ombudsman Meeting to be held on February 19, 2016, from 8:30 a.m. to 11:30 a.m. MST at the 2016 NMLS Annual Conference and Training in Phoenix, AZ.

The Office of the Comptroller of the Currency has issued Bulletins OCC 2016-3 and OCC 2016-4 with revisions of the "Installment Lending" and "Country Risk Management" booklets of the Comptroller’s Handbook. The OCC also rescinded Bulletin 2004-59, "Retail Lending: Interim Examination Procedures."

The Federal Reserve Board has announced the repeal of its Regulation AA (Unfair or Deceptive Acts or Practices, 12 CFR Part 227), which was proposed in August 2014. The repeal will be effective 30 days from publication in the Federal Register. [Note: The rule repealing Regulation AA was published February 18, 2016, at 81 FR 8133. Repeal will be effective March 21, 2016.]

The Board also released a proposal to repeal its Regulation C (Home Mortgage Disclosure, 12 CFR Part 203). to comply with Dodd-Frank Act provisions that transferred certain consumer protection rulewriting authority to the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB). The proposal was published at 81 FR 8667, February 22, 2016, with a comment period ending April 27, 2016.