NEW: The CFPB’s Money Flow Just Got Halted! (Big Banks Haven’t Been This Happy Since Pre-2008)

If you thought the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) was the last line of defense between Wall Street sharks and your grandma’s retirement savings, well…you’re gonna want to sit down for this one. Over the weekend, Trump’s new CFPB chief, Russell Vought, basically took the agency out back and put two in its chest, halting all supervision activities, slashing its funding to zero, and locking the doors on its D.C. headquarters.

(Source: Giphy) 

For anyone unfamiliar, the CFPB was born out of the 2008 financial crisis, when banks and mortgage originators nearly sent the global economy to hell in a handbasket. Congress created the agency in 2010 to keep financial institutions from screwing over consumers—aka, stopping predatory lending, shady credit card practices, and outright fraud.

Naturally, Wall Street has hated its guts ever since. However, Russell Vought, Trump’s hitman for government oversight agencies, has wasted no time gutting the CFPB like a fish, with the weekend massacre including: Zeroing out the agency’s funding for the next fiscal quarter (mainly because $700 million in current tax payers cash should keep the agency afloat for now) and Granting Elon Musk’s "Department of Government Efficiency" access to the CFPB’s IT systems to see if the CFPB matches the level of burning cash USAID was responsible for. 

(Source: Reuters) 

Which for one isn’t necessarily shocking, considering Musk has openly stated he wants to destroy the CFPB. The reason? Well his ambition to enter the consumer financial sector via X could be a part of it. Meaning, while Musk is busy running Tesla, SpaceX, X, and God knows what else, he now officially has his hands inside the regulatory body that—in a functioning democracy—should be overseeing his ventures. The National Treasury Employees Union has already filed a lawsuit to stop Musk from accessing personnel records, arguing that this could be used to harass or intimidate employees. Translation: Musk is presumably trying to dismantle his own regulator before they can regulate him.

(Source: Giphy) 

So given this, who are the winners of this? Well, given the USAID fiasco, some of the winners are us, a.k.a. America’s loyal tax paying citizens (depending on what useless spending the CFPB has put our money to use with). But more specifically, Wall Street and Big banks are set to finally come off the regulatory leash (Think the CFPB’s lawsuit on banks dealing with the Zelle clusterf**k). Which means, we should also expect a feeding frenzy in the mortgage, payday lending, and credit card industries.

(Source: CNBC) 

The losers on the other hand? CFPB employees, anyone who liked having a financial watchdog around, and to some extent consumers. Because if we all thought banks and lenders were shady before, wait until they realize the regulators aren’t doing much regulating in the meantime. 

In the end, this is definitely a double edge sword and something to really take note of this week as the CFPB has had many publicly traded companies under their microscope recently. So with that, expect some surging of shares as we start this week's trading. Of course, only time will tell what shocking discoveries come out of this regarding D.O.G.E., including how long before Trump gives the greenlight for more funding—but in the meantime, place your bets accordingly and keep your eyes out.

As always, stay safe and stay frosty, friends! Until next time… 

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Stocks.News holds positions in Tesla as mentioned in the article.