Volcker Rule Regulatory Harmonization Act
Latest action. Received in the Senate and Read twice and referred to the Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs.
Volcker Rule Regulatory Harmonization Act
(Sec. 2) This bill amends the Bank Holding Company Act of 1956 to grant exclusive rulemaking authority under the Volcker Rule to the Federal Reserve Board. (Currently, the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation, the Securities and Exchange Commission, and the Commodity Futures Trading Commission also have regulatory authority under the Volcker Rule. The Volcker Rule prohibits banking agencies from engaging in proprietary trading or entering into certain relationships with hedge funds and private-equity funds.)
(Sec. 4) The bill exempts from the Volcker Rule banks with total assets: (1) of $10 billion or less, and (2) comprised of 5% or less of trading assets and liabilities.
Written by analysts at the Congressional Research Service and published on Congress.gov, not by Civibrief. Summarized at the "Passed House amended" stage on April 13, 2018. It describes the bill, it is not the legal text.
Where is it in the process, and what happens next?
4 steps remain before this bill could become law.
The record's latest action, on April 16, 2018: Received in the Senate and Read twice and referred to the Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs.
- Clearing the committees it was referred to, and being scheduled for a floor vote
- Passage by the House
- Passage by the Senate
- The President's signature. If the President vetoes it, two-thirds of both chambers must vote to override.
How likely is it to become law?
Civibrief does not forecast outcomes and this page has no opinion about this one. What the record supports is a base rate, which is a fact about the whole pile, not a prediction about this measure.
In the 115th Congress (2017-18), 442 of the 11,421 bills and joint resolutions introduced became law, about 3.9 percent. That count covers every measure at every stage, including the many that never left committee.
This one is not there yet: 4 steps are still outstanding, listed above.
Has anyone actually voted on it?
No. No roll call in this Congress cites this measure. That is the ordinary outcome: most measures never reach a recorded floor vote, and a committee ends most of them simply by not acting.
A vote is not the only thing that happens to a measure. Hearings, markups, and referrals are all recorded actions, and none of them is a vote of the full chamber.
Who is behind it?
J. Hill (R-AR) introduced it on January 12, 2018, and 3 members have since signed on as cosponsors.
They come from both major parties: 2 Democrats, 1 Republican.
Cosponsoring is a formal signature on the text. It is not a commitment to vote for the measure, it does not bind anyone's party, and a long list of cosponsors is a measure of attention rather than of prospects.
How long has it been in play?
It was introduced on January 12, 2018, 3210 days ago. The most recent recorded action was 3116 days ago, on April 16, 2018.
Measures do not carry over. Anything the 115th Congress has not finished by January 3, 2019 dies when the term ends, and has to be introduced again from the start in the next Congress.
Every answer above is assembled from this measure's own record on Congress.gov and from published counts of what Congress has passed before. Civibrief does not predict outcomes and takes no position on any measure.
Vote history
- HouseIn committee, no floor vote yet
- SenateAwaits House passage
- PresidentAwaits both chambers