Reporters are finally getting into the details of the legislation and how it will affect each industry:
The big hammers are aimed at titans who tanked the economy, but the package tries to prevent a repeat of the trouble people got into as mortgages got too big, credit card interest shot up and other financial products turned out to be more expensive than advertised.
Among major provisions are the creation of a new agency that would monitor consumer financial products, requirements that complex financial instruments called derivatives be traded on exchanges, prohibitions against trading with a bank’s own capital and procedures for winding down failing complex institutions.
The most obvious remaining uncertainty involves the nation’s 18,000 or so car dealers, who had mounted a vigorous campaign to be excluded from the new agency’s oversight. The dealers, who swarmed Capitol Hill to make their case, maintained that they simply facilitate car loans on behalf of financial institutions and therefore should be exempt.
