The Senate adjourned on August 8, 2026 without holding a final vote on the Clarity Act. However, Senate Majority Leader John Thune filed cloture on the motion to proceed to the Clarity Act shortly before the Senate left for recess, setting up a procedural vote for September 15, 2026, the day after the Senate returns from its August recess.
On July 31, the OCC and FDIC jointly issued a proposed rule to significantly amend their existing Community Reinvestment Act (CRA) regulations that have been in place since 1995. While the proposal would retain key elements of the regulatory framework, it seeks to better align the regulations with CRA’s statutory mandate of encouraging banks to meet the credit needs of their communities by making “targeted” substantive, technical, and process-oriented changes and narrowing the scope of the rules. Toward that end, the proposal focuses on the lending test, ensures that community development grants reach the communities they are intended to benefit, and narrows the range of retail banking services the agencies consider for CRA credit by excluding deposit services. The proposed rule also seeks to provide greater clarity on how a bank receives CRA consideration and to reduce burden on banks (particularly community banks). Notably, the Federal Reserve Board (FRB) did not join the proposal.
On July 27, the OCC requested public comment on the forms entities would file to apply to issue payment stablecoins under the GENIUS Act, and the forms foreign issuers would file to register. They show how the licensing and registration process in the OCC’s March 2 proposed rule would work in practice: what an applicant sends in, what its executives have to submit, and what the OCC will use to decide. Comments are due September 25.
Troutman Pepper Locke’s Securities Investigations and Enforcement team counsels and defends clients through all stages of securities enforcement proceedings. Our attorneys have served in key government agencies and regulatory bodies, and bring their insight to bear in each representation. The team includes a former branch chief of the Division of Enforcement at the SEC, former
On June 5, the California Department of Financial Protection and Innovation (DFPI) published a Notice of Second Modification to Text of Proposed Regulation under the Digital Financial Assets Law (DFAL). The modifications respond to the Office of Administrative Law’s (OAL) disapproval of the rulemaking: OAL issued a Notice of Disapproval on May 12 and, on May 19, published a Decision of Disapproval describing the deficiencies the DFPI must resolve. Originally proposed on April 4, 2025, the regulations went through a public comment period that closed May 19, 2025, and a first modification on September 29, 2025, which renumbered the rules, modified the Money Transmission Act (MTA) exemption, and made other technical changes. The DFPI submitted its final rulemaking file to OAL on March 30, 2026. It accepted comments on the second modifications from June 5 through June 22, 2026.
On July 7, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) announced the creation of a new Retail Fraud Working Group within its Division of Enforcement. The initiative represents a structural expansion of the SEC’s enforcement capabilities and has direct implications for broker-dealers, investment advisers, and other regulated entities that serve retail clients. This is consistent with prior statements made by SEC Chairman Paul S. Atkins about focusing the SEC’s Division of Enforcement on protecting retail investors.
On May 6, the Financial Stability Board (FSB) released its first dedicated report on the private credit market’s vulnerabilities, and the findings land squarely on banks and fund managers. With private credit now at $1.5 trillion to $2 trillion globally, the FSB warns that circular funding structures, opaque borrower credit quality, and deepening interconnectedness between banks and funds could transmit stress across the financial system.
In this episode of Regulatory Oversight, co-host Stephen Piepgrass sits down with Jay Dubow and Ghillaine Reid, co-leaders of the firm’s Securities Investigation + Enforcement practice, to explore how the SEC’s enforcement agenda is evolving under Chairman Paul Atkins and what that means for public companies, financial institutions, and their executives.
On May 19, 2026, the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) proposed rule amendments that would significantly simplify executive compensation disclosure requirements for many public companies. The proposed rules would split public companies into large accelerated filers and non-accelerated filers. Non-accelerated filers would be subject to scaled executive compensation disclosure rules, similar to those presently applicable to emerging growth companies (EGCs), and they would not be required to conduct Say-on-Pay and related advisory votes. The SEC estimates that approximately 81% of public companies would be non-accelerated filers subject to these scaled disclosure rules. The remaining public companies would be large accelerated filers, representing the majority (about 93.5%) of public float, and they would remain subject to substantially the same executive compensation disclosure rules that currently apply to large accelerated filers.
On May 29, the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC or Commission) took a set of actions that together open a path for digital asset perpetual contracts to trade on registered U.S. platforms by classifying them as futures, rather than swaps, for the first time. The Commission approved the first such product, issued a policy statement on how it will review future perpetual contracts, and its staff issued separate guidance addressing foreign-listed perpetuals and customer margin and 24/7 trading. Perpetual contracts, often called perpetual futures, are futures-style instruments without a fixed expiration date, and they have until now traded almost entirely on offshore crypto trading platforms.