| Amid PPP Abuse Lenders Like
Stearns Bank Refuse As Inner City Press
Requests Basic Data
By Matthew
Russell Lee, Patreon
BBC
- Guardian
UK - Honduras
- CJR -
PFT
SDNY COURT /
SOUTH BRONX, May 23 –
Amid the
COVID-19 pandemic, fair
lending and the Community
Reinvestment Act are taking a
back seat, or worse. Some
banks to which CRA applies are
excluding smaller businesses
and those in communities of
color. And some banks bragging
about the PPP loans won't
provide any information - we
are Pressing.
Inner City Press / Community
on the Move has begun
contacting both banks and
non-banks for their Paycheck
Protection Program data.
Without yet getting into the
result, note that Stearns Bank
has for now responded to Inner
City Press' questions by
stating that: "data requested
for the Paycheck Protection
Program (PPP) and Economic
Injury Disaster Loans (EIDL)
is not required to be part of
the CRA Public File and will
not be
provided.
Thank you for your
understanding.
Stearns Bank Response Office
4140 Thielman Lane, Suite
#105,St. Cloud MN 56301 "
UNacceptable.
We'll have
more on this.
While U.S.
Comptroller of the Currency
Joseph Otting is pushing
forward with his proposal to
weaken the CRA, his new chief
national bank examiner Blake
Paulson said bank examinations
have gone 95% off-site.
The
Federal Reserve says it is
suspending "non-critical"
examinations, even at the
largest institutions.
Meanwhile the Fed
is pushing forward to approve
bank merger applications, like
Banco Bradesco - BAC which
Fair Finance Watch has been
opposing, as it has commented
to the OCC against the
acquisition of State Farm's
health savings account
business by Webster Bank,
based in part of Webster's
problematic Paycheck
Protection Program
performance.
Fintechs and other non-bank
financial firms are now at the
PPP trough and are getting
sued. For example, there is
the lawsuit filed as a class
action against Fountainhead
Commercial Capital LLC on May
6, noting the finance firm
advertised that it would
process loan requests on a
first-come, first-served basis
and then stealthly shuffled
its line of PPP applicants so
that it would lock down the
largest lending fees first.
Meanwhile Paulson of the OCC,
which wants to admit fintechs
into banking without
regulation, says no one is in
PPP for the money. This while
in response to Inner City
Press' FOIA request for
Otting's schedule the OCC
redacted the names of banks
that he met without, and
obscured others. (A FOIA
appeal has been filed.)
Amid
all this, Fair Finance Watch
and Inner City Press /
Community on the Move are
launching a new project. Watch
this site.
***
Your
support means a lot. As little as $5 a month
helps keep us going and grants you access to
exclusive bonus material on our Patreon
page. Click
here to become a patron.
Feedback:
Editorial [at] innercitypress.com
SDNY Press Room 480, front cubicle
500 Pearl Street, NY NY 10007 USA
Past
& future at UN: Room S-303, UN,
NY 10017 USA
Mail: Box 20047, Dag
Hammarskjold Station NY NY 10017
Reporter's mobile (and weekends):
718-716-3540
Other, earlier Inner City Press are
listed here,
and some are available in the ProQuest
service, and now on Lexis-Nexis.
Copyright 2006-2020 Inner City
Press, Inc. To request reprint or other
permission, e-contact Editorial [at]
innercitypress.com
|
,
