Washington, D.C. — Today, Congressman Andy Barr released the following statement regarding the Federal banking regulators’ release of the Basel III Endgame proposal.
Today, the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) and Federal Reserve (Fed) released a partisan proposal to further regulate the U.S. banking system under the guise of protecting safety and soundness to align with global governance schemes engineered by a committee headquartered in Switzerland.
The so-called Basel III Endgame proposal released today will increase capital requirements for bank holding companies up to 16 percent. This comes as the Chair of the Fed Board, multiple banking regulators and experts, and U.S. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen have said time and again that the banking system is well capitalized. Increasing capital requirements on top of 22-year high interest rates will compound an already growing credit crunch, which will harm Americans’ access to banking services and products.
Furthermore, the new imposition of increased capital, liquidity, and oversight of mid-size and regional banks will reinforce a barbell banking system, with a small number of Too-Big-To-Fail banks and a scattering number of small banks, and increase consolidation, further threatening the diversity of our system. Additionally, the proposed overhaul will impose disproportionate burdens on U.S. global financial institutions, placing them at a competitive disadvantage relative to their international peer institutions and handicapping the U.S. economy’s global posture.
As seen by the dissents of FDIC board members Hill and McKernan and Fed Governors Bowman and Waller, a handful of regulators are yet again prioritizing partisan goals over the safety and soundness of the U.S. financial system, risking further economic hardship for American families, workers, and small businesses. The Financial Services Committee and, specifically the Financial Institutions and Monetary Policy Subcommittee, will monitor the evolution of today’s partisan regulatory proposal and the growing politicization of our regulatory system and the capital regime.