Just heard from someone on the ground there.

At the Huffington Post: 

Democrats believe that public pressure and the scent of a Wall Street scandal have given them the upper hand. Republicans themselves have taken up the Democrats’ Wall Street-bashing rhetoric and have voiced hope that a bill will ultimately pass. In that light, the path to final approval seems clearer than it ever did during the contentious debate over health care.

Reid will try again.  He must be giving Dodd and Shelby time to work out a deal.

Various opinion on what’s really happening is captured by a Wall Street Journal blogger Susan Davis: 

Why are Republicans stalling financial regulatory reform legislation?

There’s five reasons, writes Marc Ambinder at The Atlantic, including Democrats’ current unpopularity and the GOP’s “substantive objections to parts of the bill based on political philosophy and their understanding of the economy.” However, Ambinder writes, the Capitol Hill bickering is more political jockeying as senators in both parties expect the bill to—eventually—pass.

“Voting to delay debate on a popular bill is not the same thing as opposing it. In the end, even Richard Shelby expects a good number of Republican senators to come aboard. By twenty points, Americans trust Obama to fix this situation more than they do Republicans. That will matter in the end. And this IS a big bill that WILL change a lot of things.”

Big Journalism takes on Rachel Maddow.

A guest piece in the American Banker this morning (not linking to it because a subscription is required) from the check cashing industry.  Money quote:

Finally, state regulation of check cashers includes licensing, record keeping and reporting requirements. Consumer protection concerns are addressed through fee caps and clearly spelled-out fee disclosure and signage requirements. Customers know up-front how much each transaction will cost. There is complete transparency.

 Similarly, payday loans are only legally available in those states that adopt specific laws allowing the product, and all include significant consumer protections that address issues such as term, rate, rollovers, renewals, etc. Again, there is complete transparency with these transactions.

 Given these facts, why expand a CFPA’s jurisdiction to include check cashing and small loans? 

Finally, state regulation of check cashers includes licensing, record keeping and reporting requirements. Consumer protection concerns are addressed through fee caps and clearly spelled-out fee disclosure and signage requirements. Customers know up-front how much each transaction will cost. There is complete transparency.

  Given these facts, why expand a CFPA’s jurisdiction to include check cashing and small loans?

 Similarly, payday loans are only legally available in those states that adopt specific laws allowing the product, and all include significant consumer protections that address issues such as term, rate, rollovers, renewals, etc. Again, there is complete transparency with these transactions. 

From Reuters: 

Indeed, the future shape and profitability of the banking industry hangs in the balance on the most sweeping overhaul of U.S. banking rules since the Great Depression, which is making its way through Congress now.

Mohamed El-Erian, co-chief investment officer of Pimco, which manages the world’s largest bond fund, said the banking system “is on a journey toward being much more utility-like because the benefits of stability today are being viewed to exceed the benefit of efficiency.”

“No society can accept a system that privatizes massive gains and socializes massive losses,” El-Erian said. “And therefore there will be a reaction, and history tells you that’s likely to be an overreaction.”

From a column in the Gainesville Sun: 

Harley-Davidson is worried that its dealer-financed loans to bikers will fall victim to new federal financing regulations. And eBay is concerned about possible restrictions on PayPal, a subsidiary, in moving money in the Internet marketplace.

——————————————–

It also illustrates what some critics say is legislation so loosely drawn that it may inadvertently cover a variety of companies that are involved in lending or moving money, even if they operate far from Wall Street and had little to do with the financial crisis. Some industries, like payday lenders, fear that the financial overhaul may be a backdoor way for Congress to regulate them, something they have successfully fought for years.

Steve Adamske, communications director of the House Financial Services Committee, acknowledges that some House legislation would regulate payday lenders, which make short-term, high-interest loans to people who promise to pay in full with their next check.

“There is a fair amount of caution any time the federal government proposes new oversight,” said Christopher Colwell, a lobbyist for Check ’n Go, a payday lender. “We are trying to determine what impacts these proposals will have on business, intentionally or unintentionally.”

While the legislation’s backers in Congress insist that most nonfinancial companies have little to worry about, many of these businesses say they are deeply concerned that the sweeping provisions in the 1,400-page Senate bill, particularly the regulation of the derivatives market, the creation of a consumer protection board and rules on corporate government, could draw them in and affect their bottom lines.

For instance, auto dealers from 35 states are converging on their senators’ offices this week to seek an exemption from legislation that would treat them as financial lending institutions subject to new federal regulations.

Including the Morning Journal in Northern Ohio.

This is good summary of what’s going on:

While the procedural vote delays formal consideration of the overhaul bill, lawmakers in both parties have said they expect it will ultimately be debated — and passed — in the coming weeks, though the exact contours of the final legislation remain uncertain.

There are signs that at least a handful of Republicans will ultimately vote for some form of the bill. Democrats in recent days have increasingly coalesced around the far-reaching legislation. They are eager to pressure Republicans into a difficult vote, in which liberals could characterize those who oppose the bill as trying to protect Wall Street.

Monday’s vote also came after a new Washington Post-ABC News poll shows that about two-thirds of Americans support stricter regulations on the way banks and other financial institutions conduct their business.

Sen Richard C. Shelby, the lead Republican negotiator, said that he and Sen. Christopher J. Dodd (D-Conn.), chairman of the Senate Banking Committee, are “conceptually very close” to a deal on the pending bill but that Shelby is pushing to “tighten up some language.”

Shelby said the changes he wants focus on three key areas: the particulars of a proposed regulator to protect consumers against lending abuses; the details of new government powers to wind down large, troubled firms without using taxpayer money; and measures to establish oversight of the sprawling and largely opaque market for financial derivatives.