President Barack Obama signed the most sweeping set of financial rules since the Great Depression today, kicking off an election-year fight to define how the law will be put into effect.
“This reform will help foster innovation, not hamper it,” Obama said today during a bill-signing ceremony at the Ronald Reagan Building in downtown Washington. “It is designed to make sure that everyone follows the same set of rules, so that firms compete on price and quality, not tricks and traps.”
With his signature, Obama capped a year-long legislative struggle to draft and pass the measure spurred by the 2008 financial crisis that triggered the collapse of Lehman Brothers Holdings and dragged down Wall Street and the US economy.
The law, named after its principal authors, Connecticut Senator Christopher Dodd and Massachusetts Representative Barney Frank, gives the government new authority to unwind failing financial firms that may threaten the entire system, imposes new rules on derivatives markets and creates a consumer-protection agency at the Federal Reserve to monitor everything from home loans to credit cards.