Consumer Finance Regulatory

Orrick's industry-leading team counsels consumer finance and fintech clients on the ever-growing array of federal and state statutes and regulations governing their services. Our lawyers are intimately familiar with the business dynamics of each consumer finance product segment and the depth of our work gives us an unparalleled view of the marketplace for companies seeking to tackle challenges and address emerging risks.

We advise clients—from global financial institutions to start-ups—across products, markets, and industries. In addition, we represent private equity firms that own these companies or are considering acquiring them.

Our clients include:

• Depository institutions
• Mortgage companies
• Fintechs, including marketplace lenders and the full spectrum of online financial services products
• Payment processors and money transmitters
• Auto, student, and specialty lenders
• Secondary market loan purchasers
• Credit, debit, and payment card companies
• Debt collectors and debt buyers
• Retail installment sellers

We regularly counsel clients in matters involving the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB), Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC), Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC), Federal Trade Commission (FTC), Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), Department of Justice (DOJ), state attorneys general, and other federal and state regulators.

Innovative Solutions

Our approach goes beyond best-in-class legal advice to proprietary technology solutions and alternative delivery arrangements—such as Winnow and Approved—that empower our clients’ in-house teams to see around corners and efficiently meet licensing and compliance requirements.

• Winnow is a comprehensive, interactive, and searchable database of state law requirements through which financial services companies can generate legal inventories tailored by business type, license and product (mortgage, auto, credit card, consumer, commercial loans and deposits, among others). It also includes laws related to the servicing of these products, and topics like marketing and advertising, debt collection, telemarketing, notary requirements, electronic signatures and documents, powers of attorney and privacy and data security.
• Approved is a licensing and regulatory examination solution that translates legal advice into licensing support services (such as helping clients obtain and maintain necessary licenses) as well as state examination support and management. We built a licensing regtech platform from the ground up to give compliance professionals confidence that they have an accurate and comprehensive view of their licensing obligations and technology solutions designed to directly address the unique challenges faced by fintechs and other financial services companies.

• Engagements

  • Advising a multinational investment bank and its affiliates on the regulatory practice requirements and restrictions that apply to their securities-based loan, residential mortgage loan platforms and other credit products.
  • Providing ongoing regulatory, compliance and state-specific licensing advice to a leading digital real estate platform regarding the development, marketing and origination of the company’s product offerings.
  • Representing a leading online lender in its dispute with the California Department of Financial Protection and Innovation (DPFI), which is challenging the client’s right to perform services for state-chartered banks in connection with loans offered by the banks to California consumers unless the loans comply with California’s interest rate caps; in November 2023, Orrick defeated a preliminary injunction sought by DPFI that effectively would have required the banks either to comply with California’s interest rate caps or forego lending to California borrowers.
  • Representing a leading buy now pay later (BNPL) company in a CFPB investigation into the company’s business practices and disclosures and the company’s advertising and bank partnership practices.
  • Advising fintech companies on approaching IPOs, performing due diligence of business models, licensure and regulatory compliance, drafting opinions for underwriters and investors, and drafting risk factors for securities filings.
  • Assisting fintech companies with their bank partnerships, including providing regulatory counsel on compliance matters, ensuring acquisition of proper licenses and negotiating bank partnership agreements.
  • Providing strategic reviews and regulatory risk assessment to numerous private equity firms regarding the clients’ potential acquisition of, or investment in, financial services companies.
  • Advising a healthcare financing fintech on multiple aspects of product development, including identifying potential licensing requirements, drafting customer documentation and loan agreements, and advising on strategic engagement with relevant regulators and policymakers.
  • Providing end-to-end regulatory and compliance advice to a large U.S. bank on consumer finance issues, including issues related to its installment, credit card and small business lending operations.
  • Represented a top-10 U.S. bank in a CFPB supervisory and potential enforcement matter that raised novel issues regarding the Bureau’s unfairness authority over state-regulated GAP waiver products sold by auto dealers and not the bank.
  • Advising an FDIC-insured bank on a variety of novel regulatory and supervision issues related to the management and oversight of its strategic partnerships with multiple fintechs, technology companies and other non-bank financial innovators.
  • Providing regulatory counsel and assistance to an established UK-based financial services company launching a fintech lending platform in the United States.
  • Advising multiple leading online loan marketplaces on the implications of new CFPB guidance regarding compliance obligations under the Real Estate Settlement Procedures Act (RESPA).
  • Providing Servicemember Civil Relief Act (SCRA) and Military Lending Act (MLA) regulatory and compliance guidance to a wide variety of clients, including banks, non-banks and credit unions.
  • Providing guidance regarding the Fair Credit Reporting Act (FCRA) to a wide variety of clients, including banks, credit unions, non-bank consumer finance companies and fintechs.
  • Developing legal, factual and statistical arguments to defend clean energy finance companies in investigations by California regulators into underwriting practices and consumer representations.
  • Representing multiple financial institutions in CFPB Prioritized Assessments of their retail deposit practices in connection with COVID-19 pandemic relief benefits and unemployment benefits deposited into consumer accounts.
  • Conducting a compliance gap analysis for a consumer finance company with a multistate footprint to evaluate regulatory risk under federal consumer protection laws, along with ongoing regulatory counseling and transactional advice for the company.
  • Successfully represented a major industry trade association of specialty commercial lenders to gain an exemption in a federal administrative rulemaking that sought to impose broad data monitoring requirements on all lenders to small businesses.