Earlier this year, in his appearance before the Senate Banking Committee and in remarks to the Consumer Bankers Association, Director Cordray attempted to defend the CFPB’s “regulation by enforcement” approach that relies on enforcement in place of rulemaking.  That approach has been widely criticized by industry and we have shared our own criticism in prior blog posts.

The CFPB’s “regulation by enforcement” approach was the subject of a recent article written for the Washington Legal Foundation by two of my colleagues, Stefanie Jackman and Dan Delnero.   The article, “CFPB’s Systemic Regulation of Four Industries: Enforcing Broader Changes Via Consent Order,” explores consent orders in the credit card, debt sales, auto finance, and data-security industries used by the CFPB to bring about systemic changes.