| Once
Otting Out of OCC To Black Knight His Anti
CRA Rule Challenged NDCA Court
By Matthew
Russell Lee, Patreon
BBC
- Guardian
UK - Honduras
- CJR -
PFT
FEDERAL
COURTHOUSE, June 25 – On May
29 Joseph Otting had his last
day as US Comptroller of the
Currency, a position he has
misused to attack the
Community Reinvestment Act he
came to despise as head of
OneWest Bank.
A
week later Ottting cashed out,
taking a paying position on
the board of directors of
Black Knight, described as a
fintech.
But if bank regulators
have a cooling off period, how
can the just former
Comptroller joint a fintech,
an industry he and his
successor worked and work to
get into the national banking
world?
Now
Otting's handiwork,
undermining the CRA, is itself
under attack, in a lawsuit
filed in the U.S. District
Court for the Northern
District of California by NCRC
and CRC; the complaint cites
"During the Senate hearings on
the CRA, Senator William
Proxmire of Wisconsin stated:
By redlining let me make it
clear what I am talking about.
I am talking about the fact
that banks and savings and
loans will take their deposits
from a community and instead
of reinvesting them in that
community, they will actually
or figuratively draw a red
line on a map around the areas
of their city, sometimes in
the inner city, sometimes in
the older neighborhoods,
sometimes ethnic and sometimes
black, but often encompassing
a great area of their
neighborhood."
As to
Acting Comptroller Brian
Brooks, Bloomberg reported
that "[a]s Coinbase’s chief
legal officer, Brooks was paid
$1.4 million in salary --
separate from the stock
options -- in the year and a
half he spent with company,
which had weighed seeking a
charter through the OCC before
making other moves to access
the banking system... He still
has stock and bond holdings
between $1 million and $2.2
million. Because he’s acting
comptroller -- not yet
nominated by President Donald
Trump to seek Senate
confirmation -- he’s not
required to take the ethics
pledge that would limit his
ability to work in lobbying
after he leaves the job,
according to an OCC spokesman.
However, Brooks has submitted
a letter through the agency’s
ethics office outlining
companies he’ll steer clear of
because of potential conflicts
of interest, including
Amazon.com Inc., Bank of
America Corp.’s Merrill Lynch
unit, Coinbase and a number of
other tech firms he’s worked
with.... Otting, who
left the job last month,
wasn’t out of work long. He
was tapped this week to join
the board of Black Knight
Inc., which provides software
for the mortgage industry."
Bloomberg did not delve into
that conflict of interest. And
what are the "other tech
firms" as to which Brooks is
acknowledging a conflict?
The
OCC wrote to Inner City Press,
faux apologizing for
withholding information it has
requested about Otting until
after he had left the agency.
Inner City Press immediately
wrote back requesting a copy
of Brooks' ethics letter and
list of companies as to which
even he acknowledges a
conflict of interest. So far,
nothing. But we note, for
example, that he was on the
board of Avant. What else?
Amid
all this, Fair Finance Watch
and Inner City Press /
Community on the Move have
launched a new project. And so
far, Brooks' national banks
have been among the worst.
Watch this site.
***
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