The US regulatory world is weaving a dynamic tapestry, as banking, securities, and compliance rules undergo waves of revision, challenge and reinterpretation.

For compliance officers and financial professionals, the challenge is no longer just following the score, it is listening carefully to every new note and anticipating sudden shifts in rhythm that could reshape the business landscape.

Crypto taskforce plans more roundtables

For a while now, US regulators have been raising the alarm over crypto-asset risks. The SEC’s newly established Crypto Task Force, unveiled in early 2025, marks a shift from the regulator’s previously enforcement-heavy approach to crypto-assets.

Led by Commissioner Hester Peirce, the taskforce brings together staff from across the agency to craft more predictable and transparent regulatory framework for digital assets. Its remit includes developing clearer rules on registration, designing tailored disclosure requirements, and refining enforcement priorities.

The taskforce aims to clarify the dividing line between securities and non-securities, a crucial distinction in the crypto world, while balancing investor protection with the need to promote innovation.

The creation of the taskforce comes after years of mounting criticism of the SEC’s retroactive enforcement strategy, which many argue stifled innovation and left both investors and crypto firms in regulatory limbo.

On March 21, 2025, the SEC’s crypto taskforce opened its public engagement with a landmark roundtable, signaling a tentative shift toward clearer rules for digital assets. The event, the first in the so-called “Spring Sprint Toward Crypto Clarity,” brought together regulators, industry lawyers, and market participants to debate whether existing securities laws suffice or whether crypto warrants its own bespoke regulatory framework.

The Crypto Task Force has now laid out its next steps, announcing four additional roundtables to be held between April and June. Each will dissect key regulatory puzzles that have long bedeviled both the crypto industry and its overseers:

• The first, on April 11, ominously titled Between a Block and a Hard Place, will tackle the delicate task of tailoring regulation for crypto trading platforms, a sector often accused of operating in regulatory grey zones.
• On April 25, the focus will shift to custody with Know Your Custodian, probing the legal and operational risks of safeguarding digital assets.
• The May 12 session, Tokenization – Moving Assets Onchain, will explore the convergence of traditional and decentralized finance, one of the most legally ambiguous frontiers of crypto innovation.
• DeFi and the American Spirit, scheduled for June 6, promises to delve into decentralized finance itself, possibly raising questions about how, if at all, the SEC can regulate financial activities without intermediaries.

The flurry of roundtables signals that, after years of regulatory hesitation and courtroom battles, crypto is no longer treated as a fringe phenomenon. Instead, it is being methodically woven into the fabric of US financial regulation.

A new era for the CFPB?

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) has been at the center of fast-moving developments. The agency recently dropped its enforcement case against several banks accused of failing to prevent fraud on the Zelle payments platform, a move that signals a broader shift as the CFPB’s power wanes.

At the same time, states have begun stepping up to fill the regulatory gap, advancing their own consumer finance rules and enforcement initiatives.

Inside the agency, turmoil has deepened in February 2025 mass firings and an order to suspend all supervisory activities followed the appointment of a Trump administration caretaker chief, who went as far as ordering CFPB offices to shut down.

On March 26, 2025, the House Subcommittee on Financial Institutions covered a hearing titled A New Era for the CFPB: Balancing Power and Reprioritizing Consumer Protections, signaling Congress’s intent to re-examine the role, structure, and operations of the CFPB.

Lawmakers reviewed a slate of legislative proposals ranging from reshaping the CFPB into a five-member bipartisan commission to subjecting the agency to the regular appropriation process, and mandating cost-benefit analysis of all rulemaking.

Supporters of these measures, including several Republican lawmakers and credit union representatives, argued that the CFPB’s current single-director model allows for unchecked power, lacks accountability, and burdens smaller financial institutions with costly and disproportionate compliance mandate.

Credit unions, in particular, voiced concerns about regulatory pressure that strained their capacity to serve members effectively.

However, the hearing also revealed strong opposition to the proposed changes. Critics warned that restructuring could paralyze the agency, citing the practical challenges of handling mounting supervisory and enforcement responsibilities with only five commissioners.

Others expressed alarm at provisions that could permit banks and other institutions to impose fees with fewer constraints and reduce CFPB oversight just as key consumer protections, including rules on credit reporting and fee transparency, have already been rolled back.

Some Democrats and consumer advocates pointed out that recent years have seen the CFPB secure over $20 billion in relief for consumers, arguing that the agency’s powers should be fortified, not diminished.

The debate left clear that, while most agree that the CFPB needs reform, how exactly to balance its power remains deeply contested.

Judge grants preliminary injunction in CFPB case

Just days later, the administration’s parallel attempt to reduce the CFPB’s footprint through staff cuts, operational shutdowns, and contract cancellations was put on hold by a federal court.

On Friday, a federal judge temporarily blocked the Trump administration’s effort to scale down the CFPB, an early target of the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) and Elon Musk. US District Judge Amy Berman Jackson issued a preliminary injunction halting staff terminations, ordering the reinstatement of dismissed employees, prohibiting the destruction of CFPB records, and reversing recent contract cancellations.

“In sum, the Court cannot look away or the CFPB will be dissolved and dismantled completely in approximately thirty days, well before this lawsuit has come to its conclusion,” Judge Jackson wrote.

The Trump administration has insisted it does not intend to eliminate the agency, pointing to the president’s nomination of Jonathan McKernan as CFPB director and plans to streamline the consumer watchdog.

It is essential that, amid these reforms, the agency is rebuilt to truly serve its core mission: protecting the rights and interests of consumers, holding accountable those who seek to profit unfairly at the expense of the citizens, especially marginalized groups.

Equally important is ensuring that the CFPB’s structure is designed to be impartial and bipartisan, so that future changes in political leadership do not again threaten the agency’s stability, effectiveness and independence.

SEC withdraws defense of climate-related disclosure rules

As anticipated, the SEC has now formally withdrawn its defense of the climate-related disclosures rule, which had been challenged by states and private parties and was pending before the US Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit. Acting SEC Chairman Mark Uyeda, who had earlier hinted at a reconsideration of the agency’s position, confirmed the decision following a Commission vote.

The rules, adopted in March 2024 under the previous administration, would have imposed a comprehensive disclosure regime on public companies, requiring them to detail climate-related financial risks and greenhouse gas emissions.

In a statement accompanying the decision, Acting Chairman Uyeda explained: “The goal of today’s Commission action and notification to the court is to cease the Commission’s involvement in the defense of the costly and unnecessarily intrusive climate change disclosure rules.”

The litigation, consolidated under Iowa v SEC, had already led the Commission to stay the effectiveness of the rules pending judicial review. Briefing was completed before the recent change in administration, but Uyeda’s comments and the Commission’s vote mark a clear departure from the previous leadership’s approach.

Following the vote, the SEC staff formally notified the court that the Commission would no longer advance its arguments in defense of the rules and would cede any allocated time for oral arguments. This decision effectively leaves the fate of the rules to the courts and signals a decisive shift in the SEC’s stance on climate-related financial regulation under the current administration.

Crenshaw further charged that the decision reflects a dangerous pattern of policymaking driven by politics rather than process

The SEC Commissioner Caroline Crenshaw, the agency’s lone Democrat, condemned the Commission’s decision to withdraw from defending the rule. Crenshaw described the move as leaving both the judiciary and market participants in a “strange and perhaps untenable situation.”

Crenshaw further charged that the decision reflects a dangerous pattern of policymaking driven by politics rather than process. She warned that the Commission is now engaged in “policymaking through avoidance and acquiescence, rather than policymaking through open, transparent, and public processes,” a trend she argued undermines good governance and the SEC’s duty to investors.

Crenshaw criticized the majority for abandoning the rule, not through formal procedures, but via a “backdoor” that she argues violates the Administrative Procedure Act (APA). “There are no backdoors or shortcuts. But that is exactly what the Commission attempts today,” she said.

Crenshaw urged the agency to either defend the rule or formally rescind it in line with APA requirements, insisting: “The Commission should do its job.”

With the SEC stepping back, the defense of the climate disclosure rules falls squarely to Democratic attorneys general from New York, Massachusetts, the District of Columbia, and more than a dozen other states who intervened last year to support the regulations.

These state officials, who have consistently backed the SEC’s authority to require climate-related disclosures, are now the primary line of defense. The litigation remains pending before the Eighth Circuit, which has yet to schedule oral arguments.

With the SEC pulling back and federal efforts increasingly gridlocked, climate-related disclosure mandates are likely to shift decisively to the states. The pending litigation over the SEC’s rules may be just the beginning of a broader trend.

New York has already reintroduced bills that, like California’s landmark climate disclosure laws adopted last year, would impose significant greenhouse gas emissions and climate risk reporting obligations. While these bills are in the early stages and face legislative uncertainty, they are signaling that states are not waiting for Washington to act.