CFPB lending rule in draft

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau is preparing to rewrite one of the basic rules of fair lending. The change sits inside Regulation B, the rule that implements the Equal Credit Opportunity Act, the 1974 law that bars discrimination in credit. A final version is now under White House review, which is usually the last stop before publication. The review entry says the draft was sent on March 30, 2026. The CFPB first proposed the rewrite on November 13, 2025. (mobile.reginfo.gov) What makes this rule so important is not the paperwork. It is the legal theory underneath it. For decades, lenders have had to worry not only about obvious, intentional discrimination, but also about policies that look neutral on paper and still shut out protected groups in practice. That is the idea known as disparate impact. Reuters reported that the CFPB’s pending final rule would drop that long-running approach and focus instead on explicitly discriminatory conduct. (usnews.com) The bureau’s own proposal says exactly where it wants to cut. It would amend Regulation B on three fronts: whether disparate impact is even recognized under the statute, what counts as “discouragement” of applicants, and what conditions apply to special purpose credit programs. In plain English, that means the CFPB is not just trimming guidance. It is trying to narrow the kinds of lending behavior that can trigger federal scrutiny in the first place. (federalregister.gov) That did not come out of nowhere. The CFPB had already changed how it enforces the law before moving to rewrite the rule. In its Fair Lending Report released on December 23, 2025, the bureau said it would no longer use disparate impact in supervision or enforcement. It said it had closed open exams and investigations that relied on that theory and terminated orders that relied on it. Rulemaking is the next step because enforcement choices can be reversed faster than regulatory text. (consumerfinance.gov) Other bank regulators were already moving in the same direction. The Office of the Comptroller of the Currency said on July 14, 2025 that it had removed references to disparate impact from its fair-lending handbook and instructed examiners not to examine for it. The OCC said it would still look for disparate treatment, meaning intentional discrimination, and still analyze mortgage data for signs of that kind of misconduct. That distinction matters because it shows the new federal posture: less interest in outcomes, more interest in proof of intent. (occ.gov) For banks and fintechs, the practical effect could be large even before any court fight is finished. If the final rule lands close to the proposal, lenders would face less federal pressure to test whether algorithms, underwriting cutoffs, pricing models, or marketing choices produce unequal results across race or sex. They would still have to avoid intentional discrimination. They would still have to navigate other laws, including state rules and, in housing credit, fair-housing doctrines that can still reach disparate impact. But one of the CFPB’s strongest tools for policing unequal outcomes would be gone from Regulation B. (consumerfinancialserviceslawmonitor.com) The most revealing detail is how openly the bureau has framed the shift. Its 2025 fair-lending report tied the change to executive orders and said future work would focus on cases with direct evidence of intentional racial discrimination and identified victims. That is a much narrower map of the lending world. It leaves less room for the older idea that a credit system can discriminate even when nobody writes the bias down. (consumerfinance.gov)