Good morning, and thank you for being here today.
In the last few decades, sectors across the economy have become more concentrated and centralized. A key priority for the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau is to ensure that consumer finance markets are fair, transparent, and competitive.
When it comes to our financial lives, a handful of very large banks and financial firms control much of the market. This has left many families with fewer viable options, and many people feel stuck to the provider they signed up with years and years ago. One of the main drivers of these trends is the simple fact that it is too hard to switch providers. Since many deposits and payments are now automatic, people feel that if they make a mistake when switching, they’ll face a nightmare of errors and fees. And sometimes, when people close an account, like a credit card, they worry that their credit score will take a hit.
Today, the CFPB is proposing a rule to activate a dormant authority under a 2010 law to accelerate much-needed competition and decentralization in banking and consumer finance by making it easier to switch to a new provider. The Personal Financial Data Rights rule would help address many of the root causes of sticky banking – by giving people more power to walk away from bad service and enabling small community banks and nascent competitors to peel away customers through better products and services with more favorable rates.
With strong data protections…
