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Pay-Day Lenders: March 2010

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Pay-Day Lenders

In The Loop: The Pay-Day Lenders' Ties To Powerful Beltway Influence-Peddlers

Zachary Roth | March 22, 2010, 10:32AM


Rick Berman, Mike Flynn and Dick Armey

We told you last week about the sophisticated Washington lobbying and PR operation that has helped the $42 billion-a-year pay-day lending industry water down provisions in the financial reform bill currently before Congress. But it looks like the industry's ties to a host of heavy-hitting, and sometimes controversial, Beltway players are even more extensive.

Those players, it appears, include a prominent and well-regarded DC consulting firm founded by top former Clinton administration staffers, a key editor at the Andrew-Breitbart-created website that hosted James O'Keefe's ACORN "exposes," Dick Armey's FreedomWorks, and a notorious corporate lobbyist known as "Dr. Evil." Taken together, the pay-day lenders' connections in the capital make clear that the industry has quietly -- and in a remarkably short time -- enmeshed itself into a network of Washington influence-peddlers skilled at putting a favorable sheen on a host of corporate causes.

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Topics: ACORN, Andrew Breitbart, Financial Regulation, FreedomWorks, Glover Park Group, James O'Keefe, Lobbyists, Michael Flynn, Pay-Day Lenders, Rick Berman

Pay-Day Lenders

With Heavy Washington Presence, Pay-Day Lenders Sway Lawmakers, Attack Critics

Zachary Roth | March 17, 2010, 12:39PM

The weakening of the Senate proposal on financial reform unveiled this week, after lobbying from the pay-day lending industry, should come as little surprise. In recent years, the industry has built a sophisticated Washington lobbying and public relations operation, which it has used to promote its interests, savage its critics, and shape the public debate.

The $42-billion-a-year pay-day lending industry offers short-term loans often designed to tide customers over until their next pay-check. But the loans, which can carry interest rates of as much as 400 percent on an annualized basis, lead many working-class borrowers to end up digging themselves deeper into debt. As a result, the pay-day lenders have become a prime target of consumer advocates and their allies on Congress, who accuse the industry of preying on struggling Americans, and have in recent years sought ways to rein it in.

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Topics: Financial Crisis, Financial Regulation, Lobbyists, Pay-Day Lenders, Public Relations, W. Allan Jones, Wright Andrews

Pay-Day Lenders

After Lobbying By Pay-Day Lenders, Dodd Bill Is Weakened

Zachary Roth | March 16, 2010, 12:33PM


Sen. Chris Dodd (D-CT).

As we've reported, the pay-day lending industry -- one of the most predatory players corners in the modern financial system -- has recently been hard at work lobbying to water down provisions in the financial regulatory reform bill currently in the Senate. (We also told you about the industry's key lobbyist, who used to be the sub-prime industry's man in Washington.)

Now Sen. Chris Dodd (D-CT) has unveiled the reform proposal that will create the basis for the Senate bill. And it looks like the industry's lobbying, up to a point, has paid off -- although it's still unhappy that it's being seriously regulated at all.

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Topics: Chris Dodd, Financial Crisis, Financial Regulation, Lobbyists, Pay-Day Lenders, Senate Banking Committee, Wall Street

Wright Andrews

Master Of Disaster: The Go-To Washington Lobbyist For Financial Predators

Zachary Roth | March 11, 2010, 3:45PM


Wright Andrews

The same Washington lobbyist who led the sub-prime mortgage industry's successful bid to shoot down government efforts to curtail risky lending is now helping pay-day lenders to water down the financial-regulatory reform bill currently before Congress.

Wright Andrews has developed a niche representing some of the least sympathetic and most predatory players in the financial industry. A veteran lawyer-lobbyist and one-time aide to Democratic senator Sam Nunn, Andrews has lobbied extensively of late for a trade association for pay-day lenders -- which offer short-term, high-interest loans to the working poor, often triggering a cycle of debt for their customers. During the last decade, Andrews ran three different trade groups for the sub-prime mortgage industry, whose home loans defaulted in massive numbers to set off the financial crisis.

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Topics: Ameriquest, Barney Frank, Bob Corker, Campaign Contributions, Campaign Finance, Chris Dodd, Chuck Schumer, Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, Financial Crisis, Gregory Meeks, Lisa Andrews, Lobbyists, Pay-Day Lenders, Senate Banking Committee, W. Allan Jones, Wright Andrews

W. Allan Jones

High-Living Pay-Day Lender CEO Tied To Bid To Weaken Financial Reform

Zachary Roth | March 10, 2010, 3:55PM


W. Allan Jones

In the wake of the biggest financial crisis since the Great Depression, a high-living, politically connected Tennessee businessman who made a fortune by lending money to the poor at sky-high interest rates has ties to a successful effort to water down financial regulatory reform.

Meet W. Allan Jones, who in 1993 founded Check Into Cash, a pay-day lending chain that says it now has 1,100 stores in 30 states. The company offers short-term loans designed to tide customers over until their next paycheck. But the interest rates can be as much as 400 percent on an annualized basis, meaning that they lead many borrowers to end up digging themselves deeper into debt.

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Topics: Bob Corker, Financial Crisis, Pay-Day Lenders, Senate Banking Committee, W. Allan Jones

Pay-Day Lenders: April 2010 »

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