On March 22, 2013, the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC), the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (FRB), and the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) (collectively, the “bank regulators”) released their final guidance on leveraged lending activities. [1] The final guidance does not deviate significantly from the proposed guidance released last year on March 26, 2012, but does attempt to provide clarity in response to the many comment letters relating to the proposed guidance received by the bank regulators. The final guidance is the latest revision and update to the interagency leveraged finance guidance first issued in April 2001. [2]

…continue reading: Bank Regulators Tackle Leveraged Lending

The OCC has published long-awaited guidance notifying federally-chartered insured depository institutions (“IDIs”) that it is prepared to grant applications to delay compliance with Section 716 of the Dodd-Frank Act (the “Swaps Pushout Rule”) for up to two years. [1] The Swaps Pushout Rule will become effective on July 16, 2013. A federally-chartered IDI [2] must submit a formal request for a transition period to the OCC by January 31, 2013. The content of such requests is discussed further below.

We believe that the Federal Reserve and the FDIC will issue similar guidance to state-chartered IDIs subject to their primary supervision. But it remains to be seen whether such guidance will address the application of the Swaps Pushout Rule to uninsured U.S. branches and agencies of foreign banks.

…continue reading: Transition Period for Swaps Pushout Rule

Summary

In October 2012, the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (the “FRB”) published in the Federal Register final rules implementing the requirements of Section 165(i)(1) of the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act (“Dodd-Frank”) concerning supervisory stress tests to be conducted by the FRB (the “Annual Supervisory Stress Test Rule”) and Section 165(i)(2) of Dodd-Frank regarding semi-annual company-run stress tests (the “Semi-Annual Company-Run Stress Test Rule,” and, together with the Annual Supervisory Stress Test Rule, the “Stress Test Rules”). The Stress Test Rules apply to bank holding companies (“BHCs”) with total consolidated assets of $50 billion or more (“Large BHCs”) and nonbank financial companies designated by the Financial Stability Oversight Council (“Designated SIFIs,” and together with Large BHCs, “Covered Companies”). Concurrent with the Stress Test Rules, the FRB, Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (“OCC”) and Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (“FDIC,” and together with the FRB and OCC, the “Agencies”) published separate final rules implementing the requirements of Section 165(i)(2) of Dodd-Frank regarding annual company-run stress tests (the “Annual Company-Run Stress Test Rules”) for supervised entities (BHCs, savings and loan holding companies (“SLHCs”) and depository institutions) with average total consolidated assets greater than $10 billion other than Covered Companies (together “Covered Institutions”). The Stress Test Rules and Annual Company-Run Stress Test Rules have substantial implications for capital planning, including capital distributions.

The specific application of the rules generally depends on the type of entity involved (for example, BHC, depository institution, or SLHC), the size of the institution and its applicable regulator. In summary, the requirements of the Stress Test Rules and Annual Company-Run Stress Test Rules are as follows:

…continue reading: Supervisory and Company-Run Stress Test Requirements

On October 19, 2012, the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (“OCC”), the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (“FDIC”) and the Federal Reserve Board (“Board”) approved final rules, which were proposed for comment in January of this year, [1] implementing the Dodd-Frank Act’s company-run stress testing requirements for all insured depository institutions with total consolidated assets of $10 billion or more. [2] In addition, the Board has simultaneously published final stress-testing rules, covering the Dodd-Frank Act’s requirements for Board-run and
company-run stress-testing requirements for banking organizations with more than $50 billion in total consolidated assets. [3]

Most of the changes between the proposed rules and the final rules involve the procedures and timelines, rather than the substance, of the required stress-testing. Highlights of the regulatory actions include:

…continue reading: Final Rules from the Federal Banking Agencies

On June 20, the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (“OCC”) issued interim final rules (including both the interim final rule and the preamble, the “Lending Limit Release”) to implement Section 610 of the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act (“Dodd-Frank”). Section 610 expands the statutory definition of “loans and extensions of credit” in the lending limit provisions of the National Bank Act [1] and Home Owners’ Loan Act [2] to include the credit exposure from repurchase and reverse repurchase transactions and securities lending and borrowing transactions (collectively, “securities financing transactions”) and derivative transactions. [3] The Lending Limit Release sets out the procedures and methodologies for calculating the credit exposure for these newly covered transactions. The Lending Limit Release also establishes a single set of lending limit rules applicable to both national banks and federal and state-chartered savings associations. The lending limit rules are effective July 21, 2012, with an exemption until January 1, 2013 for credit exposures from derivatives and securities financing transactions.

…continue reading: OCC Lending Limit Rules