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Financial Services Law Insights and Observations

Treasury official highlights fintech, crypto assets, and cloud services challenges

Federal Issues Digital Assets Fintech Privacy, Cyber Risk & Data Security Department of Treasury Nonbank Cryptocurrency Cloud Technology

Federal Issues

On February 15, Treasury Assistant Secretary for Financial Institutions Graham Steele delivered remarks before the Exchequer Club of Washington, D.C., during which he discussed the U.S. Treasury Department’s financial institutions agenda on fintech, cryptocurrency, and cloud service providers. Stating that “significant potential exists to harness the underlying technology in fintech, digital assets, and cloud services adoption,” Steele cautioned that there exist common risks across these spaces related to inadequate oversight, excessive concentration, and consumer harms.

With respect to nonbanks and fintech, Steele noted that participation by nonbanks in financial services is a key priority for Treasury. He commented that while nonbanks add diversity and competition pressure to consumer finance markets, they “have largely not been subject to the kind of comprehensive regulation and supervision to which banks are subject,” which has created numerous “risks related to regulatory arbitrage, data privacy and security, bias and discrimination, and consumer protection, among others.” Steele highlighted recent Treasury recommendations primarily focused on using existing authorities held by the federal banking regulators and the CFPB as a way to coordinate supervision of bank-fintech partnerships and credit underwriting models. Another area of concern, Steele noted, are big technology firms—those that generally seek to enter the consumer finance market via relationships with banks and third-party fintech firms, and who avoid prudential regulation, supervision, and risk-management requirements that would apply if they offered banking services. “Big Tech firms may have incentives to leverage their existing commercial relationships, consumer data, and other resources to enter new markets, expand their networks and offerings, and scale rapidly to achieve capabilities that others—including depository institutions—do not have and cannot replicate,” Steele said.

Steele also touched on Treasury’s objectives for crypto assets, in which he referred to several studies examining “the potential financial stability implications of crypto-asset activities” and the risks and opportunities they might present to consumers, investors, and businesses. He also addressed concerns about misleading claims and representations in this space (for example, with respect to the availability of deposit insurance) and noted that there exist several gaps in existing authorities over crypto assets. Finally, Steele discussed a recent Treasury report, which examined potential benefits and challenges associated with the adoption of cloud services technology by financial services firms (covered by InfoBytes here).