Federal Reserve Board Proposes Liability Concentration Limit

Dodd-Frank Federal Reserve Bank Supervision

On May 8, the Federal Reserve Board released a proposed rule that would prohibit certain financial companies from combining with another company if the resulting financial company's liabilities would exceed 10% of the aggregate consolidated liabilities of all financial companies. The rule is required by section 622 of the Dodd-Frank Act and would apply to insured depository institutions, bank holding companies, savings and loan holding companies, foreign banking organizations, companies that control insured depository institutions, and nonbank financial companies subject to Federal Reserve Board supervision pursuant to FSOC designation. The proposal generally defines liabilities of a financial institution as the difference between its risk-weighted assets, as adjusted to reflect exposures deducted from regulatory capital, and its total regulatory capital, though firms not subject to consolidated risk-based capital rules would measure liabilities using generally accepted accounting standards. Under the proposal, the Board would measure and disclose the aggregate liabilities of financial companies annually, and would calculate aggregate liabilities as a two-year average. Comments on the proposal are due by July 8, 2014.