CFPB Says Money Poised to Run Out After Opinion on Fed Funding

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau told a federal court Monday that the Trump administration has used a new legal opinion that prevents it from drawing money from the Federal Reserve, setting it on a course to deplete its funding by the end of the year.

The CFPB told the court that the Justice Department had decided that the regulator’s current funding procedure was unlawful under a new interpretation of the term “combined earnings” in the Dodd-Frank Act. The new legal review equates earnings with profits, rather than revenues, largely eliminating the Fed’s ability to channel funds to the CFPB.