Press Releases

Rep. French Hill (AR-02), along with Rep. Blaine Luetkemeyer (MO-03) and Rep. Roger Williams (TX-25), introduced H.R. 6732, the Small LENDER Act, to protect small banks and lenders from costly and excessive compliance standards. H.R. 6732 was introduced as part of a three-bill package with Reps. Luetkemeyer and Williams.

“Access to capital for small businesses is the lifeblood of our local communities, and smaller lenders often lead the way in investing in the neighborhoods they serve. However, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau’s (CFPB) proposed regulation would actually hurt small businesses by making the cost of credit more expensive and imposing significant compliance costs that fall disproportionately on smaller companies. That’s why we are proud to introduce this bill to provide regulatory relief to community banks and other small business lenders,” said Hill, Luetkemeyer, and Williams.

“In the absence of Congress repealing Section 1071 of Dodd-Frank, our bill makes necessary changes to exempt smaller banks and other lenders from having to comply with the CFPB small business data collection regulation,” added Hill, Luetkemeyer, and Williams.  

H.R. 6732 would codify “financial institution” as one that originates at least 500 covered transactions in each of the last two years, as opposed to the 25-transaction threshold proposed in the CFPB’s notice of proposed rulemaking (NPRM). The bill also codifies “small business” as one with gross annual revenues of $1 million or less in the last year instead of $5 million or less as defined in the NPRM. Finally, the bill extends the effective compliance date with the final rule to be three years after publication in the Federal Register plus a two-year grace period, as opposed to the 18-month implementation period in the NPRM.