Protecting consumers and encouraging innovation: 2019 Fair Lending Report to Congress
Today, the Bureau released our annual Fair Lending Report to Congress that highlights how in 2019 we continued to focus our fair lending efforts on mortgage lending, student loans, small business lending and other market areas. We also encouraged consumer-friendly innovation to, among other things, expand access to unbanked and underbanked consumers and their communities.
As the report also explains, in 2019:
- We encouraged industry to explore innovative ways to expand access to credit in responsible ways, including through the use of alternative data, such as cash flow data, in credit underwriting.
- We issued a Request for Information regarding “Tech Sprints” to encourage regulatory innovation and collaborate with stakeholders in developing viable solutions to regulatory compliance challenges.
- We continued to enforce the federal fair lending laws under our jurisdiction and announced a settlement with one of the ten largest HMDA reporters nationwide for intentionally reporting inaccurate information.
- We engaged with stakeholders in over 60 outreach events to: (1) educate them about fair lending compliance and access to credit issues and (2) hear their views on the Bureau’s work to inform the Bureau’s policy decisions.
Focused on protecting consumers and fostering a culture of institutional compliance, the Bureau continues to pursue its mission of ensuring fair, equitable and nondiscriminatory access to credit for consumers and communities. Our office continues to advance the Bureau’s fair lending work and expand credit access to consumers through innovation and collaboration internally and with other stakeholders including consumer advocates, civil rights organizations, industry, academia, and other government agencies. For more information on credit discrimination, see our brochures for consumers (or read in Spanish ) and for those who work with consumers ( or read in Spanish ).