My hair looking buffy.

Yeah, it is what it is.

It is what it is.

Yeah.

I'm not gonna be able to change that.

At least you know I'm honest.

Yeah, look, that dude.

That's what happens when you do construction work before you do some podcasting.

There you go.

Yeah.

Welcome back to the number one financial literacy podcast in the world.

Sitting next to me on my left is my partner in crime, Christopher Nahibi.

You know, I really don't feel like we do anything crime worthy.

Yeah, no, no, we don't.

It's just.

That's the saying, right?

If we were gangster, I would be your partner in crime, but sitting next to me is my partner not in jail time, but in physical calendar time.

Yeah.

Right now, the one and only side, Omar.

Right now time at exactly 9.

29.

Earlier than 10.

We're doing good on a Wednesday.

Yeah.

We probably would have started a little earlier had I not have been filthy from all the constructiones, but space is coming along well.

You know, this coming along well.

Electrical, hopefully tomorrow be finished.

If not early Friday morning and then Friday drywall and paint, then H vac, then flooring, then IKEA cabinets, and done for a while.

No more bleeding money.

And we're able to do that because the show has been growing and we appreciate all the listeners to show your appreciation.

What you can do is leave us an honest 5 star review on Apple or Spotify.

If you leave a good one on Apple, we'll read it.

And I'm gonna go ahead and have to insist because I'm telling you, I put in a lot of work for y'all.

Yeah.

Not for me, for you.

It's for you.

Yeah, yeah.

The peoples.

The people.

The people.

Oh, or head over to YouTube if you enjoy the.

The visual pleasures that is are prepared for you.

Make sure you hit that, like, button.

Subscribe, ring that notification bell, do all the moist goody good stuff.

You feeling okay tonight?

Doing great.

All right.

Yeah.

I want to get it out of the way at top of the show.

No, I noticed.

It's good.

Yeah.

It's not like why we want to tease anybody with good content.

Let's just throw a bunch of marketing stuff at them.

Right.

Right away.

Take it.

Yeah.

Let that sink in.

So inflation Print came out today, and let me tell you, it was, as the kids say, hot like a tiger del fuego.

Yeah.

And well, it.

It set some expectations in a very different direction.

So we're gonna cover that.

We're gonna get into it.

There's a.

Actually, I don't Know if you saw.

But there's actually a really good breakdown in the article that I posted from cnbc.

We can talk about inflation month over month, but Charlie Bellello or Bellelo, whatever, I can't say his last name.

A guy I follow on X pretty, pretty consistently, he posts price increases over the last four years.

That's a really eye opening section we're gonna talk about.

Then we're gonna talk a little bit about what this means for the probabilities and rate cuts in the future.

If you've been hearing a lot about it, we're going to give you what today you can form your own conclusions and then we're going to break down this whole CFPB nonsense and what it really means for you.

Doesn't really feel like nonsense to me.

Feels like a big deal.

Well, there's, there's some material things that have happened, some of which may be what I like to call shenanigans.

Really?

Yeah, we're going to call shenanigans a little bit.

But that all said, everybody I've talked to, including regulatory friends, people who work for, you know, the FDIC or the FRB or the state, they're equally as confused as to what's going on there.

And I'm getting questions about it.

So I'm like, you know what, maybe we answer this from a good old fashioned constitutional law.

Hey, this is how it works position.

Okay?

So people know the limitations and the possibilities of what could and most likely will happen next.

Right.

Because this was an if this is a agency or an institution that was really set up to protect the little guy.

Well, the consumer.

But yeah, certainly it came out of Dodd Frank.

It's relatively new as far as far as regulators go, but it's got a storied past.

And what really kicked this whole thing off for me, and I'm not going to play the audio because I don't want to go there, but basically he was having a conversation on Capitol Hill, Jerome Powell.

And Jerome Powell was getting grilled by frankly, my old friend Elizabeth Warren.

And Elizabeth Warren basically said to him, you know, without the cfpb, who's going to regulate for the consumer?

And Jerome Powell was like, well, you know, nobody, there's nobody.

Yeah.

And he was very matter of fact about it.

That's not actually true.

Okay, so we'll get into that as well.

But before we get anywhere near that, let's talk about the inflation from CNBC.

Here's the inflation breakdown for January 2025 in one chart.

I love articles that make it simple.

Give me one chart.

Give me one chart.

Make it easy for me.

I want the pictures.

I like it.

I like to see the graphs.

Yeah.

And then if you want to be extra sexy, give me colors, you know, make it spicy.

Okay.

I'm more of a patterns kind of guy.

It's because you can't see the colors.

I should probably tell everybody we're both getting over being sick, so there's going to be a lot of coughing this episode.

There is.

We apologize in advance or we don't.

We do that, too.

Inflation jumped in January on the back of higher prices for consumer staples like groceries and energy, because who needs to use food and power, you know?

Yeah.

That's not going to affect you, is it?

Every day it does.

You eat.

Especially now they got an electric car.

Yeah, that's a problem.

Economists worry inflation has become entrenched above the Federal Reserve's target, even as President Donald Trump's policies around tariffs and immigration threatened to exacerbate it.

And because I said that portion alone, we cannot advertise this show.

Gotta love Google's algorithm.

The Consumer Price Index, the CPI inflation gauge, rose 3% for the 12 months ended in January, the U.S.

bureau of Labor Statistics reported on Wednesday.

The January reading is up from 2.9% in December.

It marks the fourth consecutive month of increases in the annual inflation rate when it was at 2.4% in September of last year.

And I'm going to quote from my guy, Mark Zandi, because, you know, I see a Zandy quote, you get some zaddy.

Yeah, okay, there you go.

It feels like everything that could go wrong in this report did go wrong, said Mark Zandi, chief economist at Moody's.

This is not a good way to start the year if you were looking for a positive print, something to maybe help you help the case of, okay, you know, the Fed has said our goal is to get inflation down to 2%, but we don't need to wait until 2%.

Right.

To begin cutting the fed funds rate.

We just need to see it go down at a cadence.

Unfortunately, we've now seen, as you said, four months in a row, September, 2.4%, October, 2.6%, November, 2.7, December, 2.9, January 3rd.

It's so, it's, it's now, it's, it's headed in the wrong direction.

This is what we like to call a trend, kids.

Yeah.

And it's going in the, the direction that everybody hoped that it wouldn't, because this is going to really change the way the Federal Reserve.

And Jerome Powell takes action going forward.

Yeah.

And Jerome Powell addressed everybody's concerns.

Yeah.

Right.

I mean, leading into this meeting, there was no secret that at the next meeting in March, they were not gonna cut rates.

It was over a 95% probability that they were not gonna cut rates.

Yeah.

But what's really changed, and it's interesting, is the probability of rate cuts going out as far as June has changed dynamically.

Right.

And to your point, it has long believed that up until now.

Okay.

Our next rate cut will likely be in June.

We're now seeing it probably September, maybe even October.

And I'll tell you, even those probabilities are very low.

But we're going to cover that later on with a screenshot from Bloomberg.

Meanwhile, let's talk about eggs.

Do you like egg site?

I mean, I'm seeing a lot of fights break out online over eggs.

Yeah, there's a lot of egg aisles in the grocery store that are missing.

People are hoarding again.

Yeah.

They're doing the whole toilet paper thing.

Yeah.

How many eggs you eating?

I mean, I eat a lot of eggs.

No, but I mean, eggs, shelf life, not.

Not long.

No.

Three weeks.

Right.

Yeah.

I don't.

I'm not what I would call a connoisseur of eggs, but yeah, if you say so.

I believe that that sounds.

I mean, I am buying eggs every time we go to the grocery store because we're having so much.

Yeah.

Okay.

Well, they're now 53% more expensive than a year ago.

Yeah, it's a problem.

So here are some of the core categories, plus other items.

Notable year over year price changes.

So literally, in one year, eggs have gone up 53%.

You could have bought an entire egg factory and made money.

New gold.

New gold.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Other condiments, you're saying 10.3%.

You're excluding salt and other seasons SL spices, relishes and sauces.

But yeah, I don't even know how that gets its own separate category, but it's up 10.3%.

Right.

And so this falls under the category obviously of food and the inflation report, which the Fed likes to consider very volatile.

Yeah.

Okay.

So this is why they exclude food.

Now, unfortunately, there isn't really a replacement for something like eggs that people can substitute it for.

What are the messed up part about this, though?

First of all, there are egg substitutes out there.

Shame on you.

You liar.

What?

What for?

What?

What are you going to fake eggs, bro?

No, bro.

Yeah, there's fake eggs.

You just love the fake eggs.

What are You Seriously?

Huh?

No, I.

The brands.

Yeah, yeah.

I don't know the brands, but I've seen them in the section.

They come.

Those like little like paper carton things.

Something tells me that they're not very cheap.

They're.

They're not very cheap, but to, to the cheapness point.

So food at home is where this food categories all fall under.

It's like the macro parent category.

Yes.

Was only up 1.9 according to the survey.

Right.

Which as the kids say, is a little bit misconstrued.

If we're all buying eggs and eggs is up 53%.

Right.

Then you're probably going to be weighted a little bit higher than a 1.9% food increase.

But let's go over some of the other top tier categories here.

Okay.

Uncooked beef roast 7.5% Instant coffee 7.1% Bacon 6% Dried beans, peas and lentils 5.6% Uncooked ground beef 5.5% Gained candy and chewing gum 5.4% Tea 3.7% Ham 3.6% I don't know why.

Lettuce 3.3% Cookies 3.1% let's be honest, all the fun stuff went up in price.

So this is a huge problem with the report.

Right.

You think that what they would do is if eggs cost this much this month, then next month we're going to measure eggs again.

Right.

And use that.

But what the report likes to do is take.

They like to consider what a reasonable consumer would do is they would make a substitution for something if it went too high in price.

So they use a basket of goods, which again, I think is a very flawed method.

Yeah.

Zandy Zandi colored this whole thing is like, he's not setting off like a red flare, like I'm.

The sky is falling.

He said that he was setting off like a yellow flare, like, I have concerns.

I think that's probably a valid statement.

But when you look at it year over year like this, and we talk about things like eggs and bacon and, you know, and ground beef, everyone's like, chris, come on.

I mean, you're, you're being.

These things cost nothing.

So if they went up a little bit, then, you know, they don't cost that much more.

A couple points to say right off the top.

Right.

Not everybody lives with cash flow excess.

Some people, these things are meaningfully impacting their lives.

Yeah, okay, but then, then you gotta really take a step back and say, okay, we have lived through inflation as high as 9.1%.

We've been trying to get it down to 2%.

The target inflation rate for a long period of time.

It's been years at high inflation.

What is the impact of years, you say?

Yes.

Well, my buddy Charlie, he's got the answer for you.

Did the maths.

He did the maths for four years.

Okay.

From 2021 to now.

2020 to now, if you want to consider it, price increases over the last four years.

CPI.

Okay?

This is all going to be CPI numbers.

Medical care is up 9.1%.

Apparel, closed 9.3%.

New cars, up 19.0%.

Used cars, up 21.5%.

Food at home, that category that we just said was only up a little bit over 1% over four years is up 23.2%.

Shelter.

Shelter cost, 24.7%.

Food away from home.

You want to save money there.

No, no, no, no.

25%.

Electricity, 29.6.

Gas, 33.6.

Gasoline, 34.9.

Home prices, 39.4%.

Transportation, 43.5%.

Oil, 44.6.

Auto insurance, 60.9%.

And I'm not joking when I say this.

A dozen eggs is 238% more expensive today.

Wild man.

There's two videos.

There's two videos that went viral.

One that I know you've probably seen, that has been going viral for quite some time.

So the first one was Jimmy Butler.

Okay.

Got traded from the Miami Heat.

Yeah.

And now he's on the Golden State.

Warriors, which, if you're Jimmy Butler, like that, that's a W.

Right.

And got an extension for 121 million.

I mean, that's not a bad.

Who did that deal for him?

I know.

I need that agent.

He's a weird dude, but I need this agent working for me.

But somebody was recording him filling up his gas tank in California.

He's just like, this is highway robbery.

Oh, I did see that.

Yeah.

Like, what's going on?

It cost, like, over 150 bucks to blow up his car.

Crazy is he came from Miami.

I know.

I mean, it's not like he's cheap there, either.

I know.

You know, and then the second thing, right, is they're.

They're doing a comparison of Kevin's suite from Home Alone 2.

Okay.

Kevin's sweet, like the movie Home Alone to his suite from the hotel, the Plaza.

Yeah, that's right.

That's right.

He was.

The Plaza.

Is that the Plaza?

The dove lady, the bird lady in the park.

Right.

And then they showed.

They showed the receipt of him checking out.

Okay.

Take a guess.

It was $355 a night around that time in 1992.

Around Christmas time.

355 a night.

That hotel room today.

Oh, my God.

That's got to be like, three grand a night.

$4,282 a night right now.

Around Christmas time.

Yeah, around Christmas time, too.

So.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

I would never do that personally.

I mean, call me cheap.

Come on, man.

So that was going viral.

Like, that's inflation for your kids.

Yeah, dude, it's.

I look back at some of these movies and the way.

I mean, like, his grocery store receipt in Home Alone, the first one.

Right.

Was wildly cheap.

I remember when I saw it again recently, I was like, whoa, that's not a real receipt.

Come on, that's insulting.

Food was cheaper.

Yeah, Yeah, a lot cheaper.

It's kind of wild.

So.

So what happened with the stock market today, too?

Took a little bit of a hit because of this report, right?

I think it took a pretty significant hit.

I mean, my perspective.

I mean, not significant in the mood a lot, but I think what it did is it set the tone.

I saw an interesting report that I didn't bring up for the show, but basically, there's similar how we talk about recessionary economies.

There's also people who really talk about bull and bear markets, usually traders.

All right.

I know for a lot of people, just from people that I've spoken to that aren't really, I guess, well versed in this space, I'll say.

Okay.

They don't really understand why bull and why a bear market?

Oh, bull aggressive.

Time to buy.

Everything's moving up, hitting up bear market.

Like, ah, it's gonna be difficult.

It's gonna be like dragging through mud.

Slashing down.

Yeah, slashing down.

Okay, There you go.

Yeah, but.

Yeah, that's exactly.

You're right.

And to me, they're both aggressive animals.

Vicious.

You know, they're not like, vicious.

Like, why isn't it, like, donkey and, like, rabbit?

Just.

Those are actually lazy animals.

Never mind.

Probably like lion and rabbit.

You know, I guess it just seems.

It just seems like bull, bear, there's a lot of.

Right.

I would run from both of those.

Both the videos online of people actually standing around like, what are you doing?

Yeah.

And like, for the people who are like, oh, my God, I could take a bear.

No, you couldn't.

Have you seen how big some of these animals are?

You are not Khabib.

These.

These are massive animals, and there's different species and some of the.

No, no, not Gonna take a bear, bro.

Absolutely not.

You're not that guy.

Listen to this.

You think you're taking a bear, you listen the wrong podcast.

Yeah, if by bear you mean Saeed, then okay, maybe, but I mean.

Oh, God.

Chris, refrain, refrain.

We are a clean podcast.

Censored.

Yeah, don't go there.

There's so much connotation to that word for you that fits so well.

I know.

That's why I did it.

I just.

Shame on you.

Same on you, Chris.

Focus, focus.

Yeah, keep it together.

So Bloomberg's world and straight probability, you know, has been a long time on this show as our kind of barometer for where the rate cutting cycle is likely to go.

And for those of you who don't recall or don't remember, it gives us a probability of when the next Rate Fed meeting is, what the next rate cut likelihood is, and it's expressed in the form of 100% equals a probability of a 25 basis point increase.

A negative 100% equals a 25 basis point decrease.

And if it's a positive 200%, it's a 50 basis point increase.

If it's a negative 200%, it's a negative 50 basis point decrease.

So every 100% is reflective one way or the other of 25 basis points.

Yeah, 0.25%.

So going looking at 3, 19, 20, 25, the next meeting, all the way to 7, 29, 20, 26.

There is not a hundred percent probability or close to it on the horizon.

As a matter of fact, the highest probability of an interest rate cut is now in September, as said noted, and it's only a 27.3% probability.

Now, a lot of this assumes something that we have to be very clear on what this also assumes.

That is that everything continues to run smoothly.

Okay.

I know the unemployment figures recently came in and I think you have it in the show that you're going to touch on.

Actually don't.

Unemployment figures.

I just feel like unemployment's so unreliable, it's hard for us to talk about it in a consistent way.

I agree that it's unreliable, but unfortunately it's something that the Fed likes to lean on when they're making their decisions.

Can I ask just a question?

For America.

Yeah.

Or together for the people.

You mean the people.

If the government hiring of about 50,000 employees a month was propping up the employment numbers, and now we have Doge stepping in, Department of Government efficiency stepping in with Trump and Elon Musk cutting a lot of the excess spending, including jobs and hiring and suspending hiring immediately.

Like shouldn't we see a pretty significant change in the job numbers coming up quickly drop off?

Yeah, absolutely.

So then.

And you.

They're going to make it more efficient, AKA there's going to be, you know, a lot of job cuts and job layoffs.

And I know that typically speaking the, the opponents of Trump or his previous presidency believe that he is very inflationary and that you don't need an inflationary president right now.

But if he's cutting back and curtailing all the spending to try to address the deficit, I mean you would have to spend that money somewhere else and then some to be inflationary, right?

Yes.

So where is that money being spent?

Because if inflation is going up, he's just, he's too new to office for this to be him per se.

But at the same time where what is propping up inflation?

And sadly the answer is shelter.

That's the answer.

That is the biggest contributor to this inflation report.

It's been the biggest contributor to pretty much every inflation report the last several, several months.

We do know it's a lagging indicator and takes time for the data to roll in.

And we're not.

I'm actually, I have been seeing a lot of price drops, you know, the center of the country.

So you've always said that it starts there and it begins to work its way out.

Yeah.

And then.

Well, so home price increasing economies start on the coast and work their way to the middle of the country.

Home price decreasing economies start in the middle of the country and work their way out.

Exactly.

That's been my experience.

I've got no, no data to support that.

That's just I have properties in the Midwest, I have know, properties in the coast.

So that, that's just, you know, observation.

But so with the jobs report coming in recently and the unemployment figure dropping to now 4% signaling a very strong labor force.

Yeah, right.

And GDP still doing very well and inflation is now going in the opposite direction.

But there isn't much of a reason from a data point perspective that the Fed leans on to cut rates.

So the world interest rate probability, Bloomberg and the Chicago Mercantile Exchange, that also predicts the fed funds rate, you know, not pricing in a rate cut all the way until July.

Why this matters for everybody.

I know that sometimes people like to get on us for being, I don't know, too granular into the data.

But why it should matter is okay.

If you are an investor in stocks, let's say.

Right.

And the stock market right now, today, I think maybe had an overreaction to the, the CPI report because there wasn't even an expectation for a, a cut to the Fed funds rate anytime soon anyways.

I don't think it was an overreaction.

I think it was a reasonable reaction.

They thought that they now know that, okay, the, it's going to be higher for longer and the cut got pushed out even further.

Yeah, right.

And that's just going to put more stress on, on earnings for companies.

There's, it's.

When rates do come down by the fed funds rate, it makes it cheaper to borrow money, ultimately propping up the economy and increasing the probability of should rates come down.

I mean traditionally speaking, anything.

Let's use the mortgage rates for examples.

When we talk about rates coming down, we're talking about Fed funds.

But let's talk about mortgage rates as a proxy for kind of the bigger picture.

The average mortgage rate across the United States historically is closer to 8%.

The average.

We're still below that average.

We know that shelters but that's not the point.

It's not the point, but we know that shelter is, it's got problems.

Right?

The, the shelter metric has got problems.

We have no solution to the affordability crisis.

We have no solution to wages.

Wages have not kept up with the increase the price of homes.

So like, you know, like our, our friends the realtors like to point to.

It's the rate.

It's the rate.

It's the rate.

No, no, no.

It's not just the rate.

So isn't it a good thing though that, that the market sensed a little bit of like oh my God, inflation's not going away.

Let's get a little bit of reality check.

We're going to be here for a longer time.

In my mind, the stock market's overvalued.

It is.

It is, yes.

Home values or homes are overvalued.

None of this is new to my point, right?

No, it's not new.

Right.

So just is delaying the inevitable.

So of, you know, eventually the Fed is going to have to come off their position.

But the, the world interest rate probability pushing out a cut assumes that everything is going to continue to be fine.

If in fact unemployment starts to head the other way right away, it is the Fed's responsibility to cut rates immediately.

Right?

Yes.

If it's drastic enough.

Right.

Or if something in the financial markets breaks.

Right.

They are, they will be required to because they do need to at the end of the day make sure they stabilize prices and provide maximum employment.

But and again, and I keep asking the Question.

What is going to break that's going to trigger this?

Do I think there's asset bubbles out there?

Yeah, I do.

Do I think that there's a, a trigger event that's going to, it's going to cause something cataclysmic?

No, I don't.

And until such time as something becomes visible as a concern, you know, I don't really know what that could be.

And everybody out there is pontificating and I think that we shouldn't do that at this point in time because we are in uncharted terr.

Yeah.

I mean, it, it shouldn't just now start to concern everybody that, you know, the Mag 7 is really propping up the entire market.

Right.

I've got a theory there too.

I mean, if you think about it, AI is revolutionary, Right?

Quantum computing we talked about on the show, revolutionary.

This tech boom will be the, one of the biggest contributors to humanity.

I know we thought the, you know, the Internet was going to be a huge deal, but did it change?

No, it gave us a faster, more efficient way of doing things.

I think AI has a lot more ramifications for humanity.

So maybe that valuation for those companies is real.

We don't know.

I mean, again, speculative.

But I look at how transformative some of the technology we're dealing with now could be and I think to myself, like, this is serious, like, this could be real.

Right.

We, I mean, Joe Rogan always talks about it on his podcast, but.

But he's always talking about how we're creating the next type of life form and it's going to be a silicon based life form and we're carbon based life forms.

Right.

So if we're, if that's how transformative what we're doing is, then yeah, maybe there's some serious reasons why those companies are valued the way they are.

But again, asset bubbles being what they are, I know this is real.

What goes up eventually does have to come down.

And what's going to send us down is still an unknown.

Mm.

So.

Well, while inflation remains a top concern for all Americans, you, me, everybody around us, and I will tell you, I feel it now more than ever.

Another battle is playing out in Washington, which we've all heard about.

One that could change how financial regulation works in this country pretty dramatically.

Although I will admit that I think some of the hysteria around it has been over politicized and is overdramatic.

Really?

Because I'd love to hear your explanation on this.

Oh, I feel like there's a no.

Because I'm, I'M differing opinion here.

No, I, I'm genuinely concerned.

You know, there's, there's one particular group of people that are really excited about this.

Who's that?

Oh, your bros.

Crypto bros.

Your crypto bros are very excited.

Yeah.

Their rug pulls just got a little bit easier.

But I will say that the CFPB hasn't really come down on crypto, that it's been the FBI and the sec.

But maybe we'll get into it in a second.

But the CFPB and the SEC are, are the two agencies that have really kind of been fighting the fight against X and Twitter, against Facebook, from entering into this financial space.

They're, they're the only two agencies.

Well, how about this?

We will leave this to the audience to form their own opinion because I'm not advocating one way or the other.

I want to be very matter of fact about this.

I have a tremendous amount of respect for all the agencies, including the cfpb.

But I also understand some of the criticisms about regulation and how convoluted it may feel to some people.

Okay, so I don't know that I have an answer one way or the other, but I do know that what's happening now is, is being mislabeled by the masses.

Tantamount in my mind to the same way that people don't understand tariffs.

I think people understand this as well.

So I want to explain what's happened because there's a lot of names that have been thrown out and a lot of circumstances that have changed.

And then hopefully we can explain why this is not as clear a path to shutting down an agency if people think so.

According to Reuters, an article came out and if this is not what, you know, the facts to be today, there's a reason for it.

So bear with me here.

Trump consumer watchdog freezes CFPB activity on first day on the job.

US Treasury Secretary Scott Besant, who took over on Monday, and this is a couple weeks ago, as President Donald Trump's new acting consumer finance watchdog, has halted virtually all, all pending activities at the US Consumer Finance Protection Bureau, including investigations, rulemaking, litigations, and public communications, according to an email seen by Reuters.

So that was the first thing, right?

So you got the US Treasury Secretary steps in and goes, nuh, we're shutting this bad boy down.

No, no, no, no, no, no.

But can he do that?

Keep in mind, the CFPB came out of the Dodd Frank act and we'll talk about that.

But there are three branches of powers, and these branches of powers were designed by the original Constitution in order to safeguard our protections as American citizens.

When you said that right now, I just pictured you being Nicholas Cage from National Treasure.

Oh, really?

Am I balding that much?

No.

Come on, that's a great movie.

It was surprisingly good.

It was surprisingly good.

So you got the legislative, judicial and executive branches right?

And there are limitations on each one of their powers to ensure that there's checks and balances in the system.

The entire system is built on this.

So for the executive branch to have a proxy that is the US Treasury Secretary, to step in and say, hey, we're shutting things down, that's not quite accurate.

But wait, there's more.

This, according to NBC News Office of Management and Budget Director Russell Voight, now a second party, issued a series of directives to the Consumer Finance Protection Bureau employees Saturday night in his new capacity as the Bureau's acting head, effectively slow slowing a large part of the Bureau's activity to a standstill.

So now not shutting down, slowing it to a standstill.

Right.

Okay.

In the emails to the CFPB employees, which was.

Which were obtained by NBC News, Voight confirmed that he has taken on the role of acting head of the Bureau and announced a dozen directives that would go into effect immediately.

Can you imagine being just going into work that day and you're like, oh, there's a new acting head.

Oh, I'm not going into work today.

Yeah, I have to stop doing my research into the scam.

Well, it's crazy, too.

I mean, I make it, like, sarcastic because it's a crazy email to get, but can you imagine how stressful it's got to be for them?

Like, do I have a job?

Do I not have a job?

Absolutely.

Am I employed?

Am I not employed?

And then if, even if you're not in the cfpb, if you're another government agency, oh, yeah, like, you've got to be going, like, what's the status?

And you.

If I know, it's easy people to go, oh, it's government agency, they can get another job, a government employee.

Okay.

Some of these people have pensions that they're working towards.

You know, some of these people have.

The only reason they took government service is so they can get their pension when, you know, they complete 20 years of service and they can get paid.

And if you get in when you're 20 and you at 40, you can effectively retire with benefits with.

With, you know, a significant portion of your salary putting that at risk, particularly when you're closer towards the 10 year of your pension.

Like you could be freaking out.

Yeah, I can only imagine.

So I don't mean to downplay the risk at all.

I'm just saying, like, these are, these are strange times.

So employees were instructed to.

And here's the instruction from Voight, cease all supervision and examination activity.

Cease all stakeholder engagement.

Pause all pending investigations and do not issue any public communications and pause all enforcement actions.

This is wild, man.

This is.

I can't believe that there isn't a bigger uproar about this.

Well, I don't think most people understand what a lot of these agencies do because it's.

People go, oh, sec, their securities.

Yes, they go fdic, okay, that's insurance.

I see it on all my checks.

But if you're not in the business, then you probably don't understand what these agencies do that where they come from.

And we'll get there.

So we'll explain this one a little bit so we'll give some clarity and color here.

Void.

Also told employees not to, quote, approve or issue any proposed or final rules or formal or informal guidance and to, quote, suspend the effective dates of all final rules that have been issued or published but that have not yet become effective.

Among other directives.

He said in that email that the directives effective.

These directives are effective immediately unless he approves exceptions or certain activities are required by law.

So now you've had the U.S.

treasury Secretary Scott Besant come in and shut you down.

Basically.

You had Voigt come in, an issue a series of directives which effectively slow you down to the point of being shut down.

And then according to Housing Wire, just Yesterday morning, Jonathan McKernan, who, for those of you who don't know Jonathan, Jonathan is a stand up guy, an attorney who came, I think, I think he worked in Tennessee.

He's been in the political zeitgeist for a while.

He was on the FDIC board the day before this, actually, I think two days before it, he resigned from the FDIC board saying that because another Republican was named, there was too many Republicans on the FDIC board.

He was stepping away.

On the board of the FDIC was a gentleman by the name of Rohit.

And Rohit was the then CFPB head.

Wow.

Rohit basically stepped down, stepped aside.

And it's presumed that he's off the FDIC board.

But Jonathan McKernan, who now was on the FDIC board and I think he was the vice chair, has now taken over the role as director of the CFPB.

Wow.

So it sounds a little incestuous but Jonathan McKern is a standup dude, got a good pedigree and background.

Rohit, who was on the FDIC board, these men know each other.

He now backfills for Rohit's position.

And I think Rohit just out of a job.

President Trump nominated Jonathan McKernan, who previously served as the board, as a board member of the FDIC and Senior Counsel of Policy at fhfa, to be director of the CFPB on Tuesday, capping a chaotic week for the bureau.

So now the third person to be to be brought to the Bureau and Jonathan McKernan for the record, was the vice chair who investigated Grunberg and led the investigations into some of the illicit and bad behavior at the FDIC.

So great standup pedigree.

Right?

McKernan has also experience in the Senate, having served as a senior financial policy advisor to Senator Bob Corker, a Tennessee Republican who served as a chair of the influential Senate Foreign Relations Committee as well as counsel for the Senate Committee on Banking, Housing and urban affairs in 2021 through 2022.

McKernan has also served as senior counsel to the U.S.

treasury.

Stud.

I mean.

Yeah.

And I will say, when I called him, he answered the phone.

No way.

Yeah.

First time I called him, ever, he answered the phone, talked to me for like 30 minutes.

I was, you're not.

Are you not busier than this?

I was like, bro, you, you, you know, I'm not like, important.

Right.

So wait, I think we need to do.

Let's, let's backtrack also just a little bit before we get into why you think that some of this may be blown out of proportion.

Would that be fair to say?

I wouldn't say born out of proportion.

I would say.

I would say that there is an unknown and a question mark as to how effective this is all going to be at shutting them down, per se.

Right.

So CFPB stands for Consumer Financial Bureau.

Right.

Protection.

Protection Bureau.

Right.

Okay.

Let's get into some of the things that they have done in the past for people to understand why they're so important.

Oh, no, no, no, no.

I got a whole section.

Give me, give me, let me get through the articles.

I got a section.

Oh, okay, bro, Read the show notes, bro.

I got my own show notes.

I know you're ready to go.

Don't swing for me.

I want that.

They have done a lot and gave and found a lot of money for people that they've been scammed out of like some of somewhere upwards of like $20 billion.

Yeah, they've done a lot.

Yeah, but it's not without its political stigma, though, because Rohit, the prior director, was going after like large banks and going after some big names.

They only have so many staff members, though.

I mean, I get it, but I'm just saying, like, it's a little controversial.

Still kind of interesting.

There are opinions both sides of the aisle.

I'm not taking a stance.

Your boy Elon strike a deal with Visa recently?

I have no comment on the matter.

Side.

You just giggled.

I hope you spit that up.

Fresco.

Who drinks a fresco?

Seriously?

Come on.

It's so good.

So much aspartame.

Yeah, that's what's going to make you live longer.

Don't knock it till you try it.

McCurdy inherits a government agency that has been all but shut down over the last week on President Trump's orders.

Quarters through Acting Director Scott Bessette, Treasury Secretary.

And then Russell Voight, Director of the White House Office of Management and Budget, which I didn't know was an office, by the way.

Voight was named Acting Director on Friday and quickly moved to shut down most of the operations of the Bureau on Saturday, ordering staff to discontinue supervisor activity, investigations and enforcement, suspending the activity of the effective dates of all final rules that have been issued or published or blah, blah, blah, going to effect.

Okay, so we know what Voight did.

Significantly, Voight also cut off the Bureau's funding, posting this message on his X account on Saturday night.

Can you imagine?

You get an email on Saturday, if you check it, and then he puts this on X for the world to see on Saturday night.

Pursuant to the Consumer Financial Protection Act, I have notified the Federal Reserve that the CFPB will not be taking its next draw of unappropriated funding because it is not reasonably necessary to carry out its duties.

The Bureau's current balance of $711.6 million is in fact excessive in the current fiscal environment.

That's a tough sell, bro.

This spigot, long contributing to CFPB's unaccountability, is now being turned off.

Okay.

How are you supposed to react to that if you're an employee?

Okay, I know we're.

I, I have, I'm very, I feel very bad for the employees because.

Worse.

Yeah, the worst.

Yeah, yeah.

On Sunday, the next day.

So Sunday, Saturday afternoon, he sends the email, shutting everybody down.

Jumping off of.

Of.

Of beset email.

Right.

So he's springboarding off of what they already knew was a problem.

Terrible way of handling it.

Then Saturday night He sends that message out saying, we're not taking any more money because we got more than enough.

And, you know, it's.

They've been gone unchecked.

Then Sunday, this dude had a wild weekend, bro.

I don't know if he's drinking or what.

On Sunday, Voight also shut the CFPB's headquarters and ordered all staff to work from home this week before directing them to stop all bureau work on Monday.

On Monday, he says, just stop all work.

McKernan's nomination has been sent to the Senate for confirmation, where he's undoubtedly going to get approved.

He's.

He's a stud.

It's going to be fine.

Can you imagine that's your weekend as a CFPB employee?

Like, how wildly stunned are you on Monday when you get told, just stop all work?

Especially when you feel like you're.

What you're doing, the work that you're doing is for the greater good of the peoples.

The people.

Yeah, dude, I, I nobody.

Like, let's be clear.

I don't think anybody at the CFPB had malicious intent.

No, I don't think they were doing things in a nefarious, you know, quasi government way.

I think they were just trying to do their job under the mandate.

And we'll get to the mandate in a little bit, but I have to go one more article, because anytime I see Elizabeth Warren pop up, you know, I have to.

Yeah, yeah.

You know what she's capable of.

You know, I know what she's capable of.

She crazy.

So this, according to Yahoo.

Finance, Senator Elizabeth Warren said Wednesday that the law clearly states only Congress can shutter the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, setting up a potential legal clash with President Donald Trump after the administration moved to freeze the agency's operations.

Factor.

Cap said, I want to say to me, that's gotta be fact.

It should be fact.

It's fact.

A fact.

Yeah.

Double negative.

Oh, yeah.

Double positive.

Double positive.

I don't know.

I'm all for the double positives.

That is true.

It is Congress that created the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, and it is only Congress, not Donald Trump, not Elon Musk.

She's throwing shade.

Yeah, not a smart move.

She don't like the billionaires, bro.

Who can actually get rid of the cfpb.

Warren, who's a Democrat from Massachusetts, as you might know, told Yahoo.

Finance in an interview, if Trump and Musk, who oversee the new Department of Government Efficiency, Doge don't abide by the law.

She added, this is a quote, then we've got to go to court and make that happen.

Except they can limit their scope of work without shutting them down, which is effectively what they've done.

Well, yeah.

What they ultimately will end up at.

Yeah.

So the next section of the show is going to do exactly what Saeed's been foaming at the mouth to do.

And obviously, Saeed has a very positive spin on what he thinks they've done.

So I'm all for it.

I'm here for it.

You're here for it.

Okay.

Let me give a little bit of an intro about where they came from, and then I will let you off the chain.

Okay, let's go.

Are you ready?

Let's go.

Let's do it, man.

No, you're excited.

Let's do it.

Okay.

All right.

The Consumer Financial protection bureau, the CFPB, was established in 2011.

So a baby bureau.

Baby.

That's cute.

It's grogu.

Right.

So it hasn't been around that long.

And.

Well, under the Dodd Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection act following the 2008 financial crisis, its primary mission is to implement and enforce federal consumer financial laws.

Consumer financial laws to be underlined and underscored.

Okay.

Ensuring that consumers have access to fair, transparent, and competitive financial markets.

The CFPB consolidates Consumer Financial Protection Bureau authorities that previously existed across multiple federal agencies into one, aiming to increase accountability, effectiveness in safeguards, and safeguarding consumers from financial abuses.

Legally.

The CFPB was created by an act of Congress, and it is, and its disillusion would typically.

Typically is a word here.

Require congressional action.

However, the administration has explored ways to limit the Bureau's effectiveness without direct congressional approval, which is effectively what they've done.

For instance, by ordering employees to cease work and proposing a total budget of $0 for the CFPB, the administration aims to neutralize the agency's operations.

And I've got some Supreme Court stuff here, but go ahead, say, give it to me.

Give me all the goodies.

So I wanted to get into some of the things that the CFPB has been able to accomplish over the years so people can appreciate this agency a little bit more.

Okay.

Gives me.

All right, let's start off with Wells Fargo fake account scandal.

That's a problem.

That was a big one.

That's a big one.

What happened?

Wells Fargo employees opened millions of unauthorized accounts, leading to unexpected fees and credit damage.

Kind of a big deal.

Broke CFPB's action.

2016 find Wells Fargo.

$100 million for fraudulent activity.

Thank you.

Yeah.

Without them, who was going to do.

Was A big scandal.

It was in the headlines.

I know a lot of the players that were there.

I know a lot of the people who had accounts open like that.

I actually had an account open like that.

I actually did too.

I actually worked there and saw people doing it.

Oh, okay.

I didn't know that.

Yeah, look, businesses are tough, man.

When you've got this culture to grow and scale and you got Wall street accountability, I'm not putting fault or blame on anybody.

But that, that was a pretty eye opening experience and I think the bank in a lot of ways is still recovering from it a little bit today.

Oh, well, that was only.

That was in 2016.

I neglected to say in 2022 they find him an additional 3.7 billion.

Oh yeah, that's right.

So yeah, that's why they're still hurting.

Number two, student loan servicing misconduct.

Okay, what happened, Navient?

Yeah, they're, they're a big student loan servicer.

Big student loan servicer was found to have misled borrowers about repayment options.

Right.

That's not good.

Not good.

Ordinavian to pay 1.7 billion in loan forgivenesses for 66,000 borrowers.

Without them, who was going to fight for the little guy?

Okay.

Borrowers and 95 million in restitution affected consumers.

The impact?

Thousands of struggling student loan borrowers received relief and servicing practices and were scrutinized.

Number three, mortgage relief for distressed borrowers.

What happened?

Mortgage servicers were engaging in unfair foreclosure practices including robo signing and failing to provide proper loan modification options.

So with the CFPB stepping in, it almost forces banks to work out foreclosure options and not hit borrowers with high service fees.

So that almost forcing them to foreclose even sooner.

Right.

They can step in and they can make the bank almost work out a resolution with the borrowers.

Okay.

Number four, junk fee crackdowns.

What happened?

Banks and financial institutions were charging hidden fees on overdrafts, credit cards and bank accounts costing consumers billions.

Look, I'm not, I'm not saying they didn't do good work, but there are other agencies that do some of the stuff too.

Not to this level.

And the problem is there's not, in my opinion, there's not.

There wasn't enough staffing to go after all the scammers.

Right now you open up the floodgates.

That's why I said the crypto Bros and the meme coins, they're going to be running wild.

I, I don't know about that.

I have a whole what would happen if the CFPB was shut down?

Who Pick up a slack section here so we can get into some hypotheticals.

But, so it's, it's important to note that the Supreme Court has all had to weigh in on the cfpb, because when it was originally drafted, it was drafted a little bit too.

A little bit too much like the, like Jerome Powell, like they, they wanted to create this insulated from the President.

Nobody can remove the figurehead role.

And.

Well, that changed.

I see what you mean.

Okay, so in 2020 case law sala Law LLC v.

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, the court ruled that the CFPB's leadership structure, which allowed the Director to be removed only for cause, violated the separation of powers.

The court concluded that that the unconstitutional removal provision could be severed from the rest of the law, allowing the CFPB to continue operating with the Director removable at the will of the President.

So now because of this law that took the change in 2020, and because it was ruled unconstitutional, the President can remove somebody and put somebody in like he did with Jonathan McCan.

In summary, while the President and the administration officials can take action to limit the CFPB's operations like they have fully dismantling the agency would require legislative action by Congress.

The current efforts to shut down the CFPB involve administrative strategies to halt its functions and reduce its budget.

But the legal foundation of the agency remains intact until Congress decides otherwise.

So the natural question is, what happens if the CFPB is shut down?

That is natural.

And that's, that's my.

That's what I want to know.

Okay, you, you are effectively shutting down an agency that is supposed to help the.

Okay, not just the little guy.

I know it helps everybody.

But the guy that needs the help the most, that can't afford to hire somebody on their own because they're being squeezed every month due to inflation, right?

You have an agency like this that's looking out for them and you can actually go and reach out to and file a complaint, right?

You technically, or you seize their operations.

How are you going to give me the warm and fuzzies and make me feel good that who's looking after me now?

Okay, well, how about this?

How about.

And I'm only playing devil's advocate.

I'm giving, I'm just trying to give you the perspective.

I don't disagree with you, but, you know, I'm giving you the perspective.

Okay, so before the CFPB was created in response to the, the great financial crisis in 2008, Dodd Frank rolled out and you know, was created so was the ability to repay rules.

So many other rules that we still use and hold, hold pretty, pretty good regard for to this day.

I don't think all of Dodd Frank was wrong.

There were other agencies that picked up the slack.

So yes, there would be a void if they were gone.

But other, other agencies that regulate banks and financial services are out there.

Okay.

And the CFPB is the only one dedicated solely to consumer financial protection.

I agree.

Without the oversight would be fragmented but consumers would still be protected.

Enforcement would be weaker, I think in total, but you would still get consumer protection from other agencies.

So who would pick up the slack?

Natural question.

Agencies like the Federal Reserve, the fdic, the Federal Insurance Corporation, the OCC office, the COMP Control, the Currency, the ncua, credit unions, HUD and the FTC would oversee certain aspects of financial regulation.

None are as consumer focused as you know as the CFPB was or is.

Right.

But, but we've all, we've all been.

At, at had jobs before.

If whether that's during this last cycle, the last two, three years or a previous cycle where there have been rounds of layoffs, let's just say.

And you have to pick up the responsibilities of other departments just because it's.

Not, it's not fun.

I don't disagree.

Yeah, like these are, these other agencies have their own line of work that they have to do.

To say that you are now also going to be taking on the responsibility of looking after consumer financial protection.

Wasn't the whole point of DOGE though to say okay, the way we're doing it is not efficient?

Yes.

And wasn't the point to say okay, how can we be more efficient with our dollars?

But there's no, there's no plan laid out to say okay, here's what we're going to do instead.

Okay, well then allow me to give you a plan.

Give me the plan.

Okay, I just want to plan.

Give me a roadmap using the way that it was done before.

I have a roadmap for you.

Give me the roadmap.

I bet you didn't see that coming, did you, Socrates?

Give me the Thomas Guide.

So crates.

All right, so the Federal Trade Commission, the FTC would likely assume some of the consumer protection roles, particularly for non bank financial services.

Think payday lenders, debt collectors, credit reporting agencies.

However, the FTC lacks direct oversight of banks.

They never had direct oversight of banks.

But the Office of the Comp, Control of the Currency, the Federal Reserve and the FDIC would Continue supervising banks, but their primary role is ensuring financial stability, not aggressively pursuing consumer complaints.

But you could certainly add or layer some of that into their job.

Okay, again, I'm speaking from efficiency.

I don't know if they have a staffing for it, but I'm just saying that that's the goal.

Right.

State Attorney generals could increase enforcement actions against predatory lending and deceptive practices.

In my mind, that might even be a better solution, more elegant because state Attorney generals have a lot more pressure on them to make sure their constituents, their, their state representatives are being protected versus a federal agency which is all over the nation and they can't be everywhere at once.

There's also a lot more attorney generals than there are CFPB representatives.

Right, okay, so.

But enforcement would become a patchwork and inconsistent across different states as opposed to one agency guiding it from a structured path.

So it isn't the best solution, but this is essentially the way it was done before.

So you would be giving back these responsibilities to these other agencies that are out there.

And it'd be very fragmented.

Not saying it's a good thing, not saying it's a win.

But I think that's the argument from an efficiency standpoint.

Okay, you could easily say that.

However, you know, and I'll just throw out a different scenario.

And I'm not, I'm not advocating, but I'm just saying, okay, if you want to be efficient.

This is a great example.

Right.

I talked about the Office of Comp Control, the currency, the Federal Reserve and the fdic.

All three of them regulate banks.

Why do you need three regulators for banks?

And not to mention there's also state non member banks that are regulated by the state as well.

Technically you can have four.

So it has something to do with their size.

Right?

Some of it has to do with size, some has to do with member versus non member banks, some of it has to do with.

With do you have a holding company or not?

All of them have FDIC insurance, typically speaking.

So they're all regulated by the FDIC in some way, shape or form.

So I guess do you need all those four banks?

Do you need to have them separated the way that you do?

Would that be a much more efficient thing to look at versus the cfpb?

Why is the CFPB where you started?

There wasn't a lot of communication around that.

And it has been a little unclear to your point.

Now I get it that Doge is supposed to come in and make some, make everything a little bit more efficient.

Right?

That was the intent I'm not saying.

That it's successful, but it's not a secret that this does personally benefit Elon.

Personally?

How so?

He just striked a deal with Visa.

And it's no secret that Elon wants to make X or Twitter an all in one platform.

Explain the Visa deal.

I don't know the Visa deal, but he wants to make it an all in one platform.

Right.

So he hasn't, he hasn't really disclosed what he wants to do with Visa on, on, on X.

But you gotta imagine that with anything new like that, I mean, scams are going to be running wild.

Let's see what he's doing here.

In January, Mr.

Musk announced a partnership with Visa to build a peer to peer payment system called the X Money account.

The deal was a major step for X toward becoming what Mr.

Musk has called an everything app.

There you go.

Yeah.

With attack on Consumer Bureau, Musk removes obstacle to his ex money vision.

This is from the New York Times, which I don't have a subscription to.

Good to know.

All right then.

But there's another version on NPR and UnFortune, what banks need to know about Elon Musk X Money.

And not to mention that also I remember not too long ago, it's a digital wallet.

That's what he's basically offering.

Yeah, right, Exactly.

Wasn't Meta coming out with their own line of.

Their own line of currency called Visa.

Will enable X users Liba or something.

What wasn't it wasn't Meta coming out with their own currency called Liba or something like that?

I did not know.

I've never heard of that.

Visa will enable X users to move funds between traditional bank accounts and their digital wallet and make instant peer to peer payments.

Yakarino said, like Zelle or Venmo.

It's the first concrete move from X to create a financial ecosystem for the social media site which was called Twitter before Musk purchased it in 2022.

At the time, Musk, who's also CEO of Tesla, said that the $44 billion acquisition was a way to create an everything app.

He later said the platform would enable users to conduct their entire financial world on it.

Right, and it was.

Sorry, it was Libra.

Libra, okay.

Libra was a cryptocurrency project by Facebook that was later renamed Diem.

The project was intended to be a global digital currency that could be used to make purchases.

However, it was eventually discontinued.

It was supposed to be a stable coin, meaning it was backed by a basket of assets like government debt and.

Maybe Is there such a thing as a stable coin backed by nothing but a narrative like we talked about in the last show?

If narratives drive what we're doing, do the narratives.

It just all comes down to whether you believe believe in the coin or not.

And if enough people believe in it.

Well, I didn't want to be all for one side or the other on this CFPB thing.

So I also said spend some time to write down what would be lost without the cfpb.

So this is what I like to call affectionately, the site is Happy section.

I'm fighting for those 1600 employees.

No, I get it, dude.

It sucks.

I'm not, I'm not advocating.

I'm just.

I knew that you were going to take the attack that you did because I know my man of the people.

I know you're man.

I'm the people's champ.

So I took, I took the other side.

But this is truly what I put together for what we would lose out the cfpb.

And I think it's meaningful.

So the cfpb.

The CFPB plays a unique role in protecting consumers.

Its elimination will lead to several key losses.

All right.

Centralized consumer protection.

As we talked about earlier, it was created to consolidate enforcement efforts across multiple agencies, reducing regulatory gaps.

Without it, oversight becomes fragmented once again.

And clearly we did this because it wasn't working when it was fragmented.

So we're going back to something that we knew didn't work.

Yeah, there you go.

Direct consumer advocacy.

The CFPB files hundreds of thousands of consumer complaints annually, forcing banks and lenders to respond.

No other agency provides this level of direct consumer assistance.

There is no other way to do this.

So you would lose that ability right off the gate.

I mean, you could always recreate it someplace else.

But then what are we doing here?

How long would that take?

Yeah.

Fair Lending investigations.

The CFPB leads enforcement actions against discriminatory lending practices, junk fees, and predatory lenders.

Like, say you mentioned, a lack of oversight would likely lead to more abuses or unrecognized abuses.

That's a problem.

Rulemaking on consumer finance.

The CFPB sets rules for mortgages, credit cards, auto loans, and payday lending.

Without it, banks and lenders would face fewer restrictions.

And let's be honest, the ecosystem that we have today in capitalism and corporate America is that people will do what they can to increase their profits because.

They have shareholders to appease.

And it's not an ethical or moral question for a lot of these people.

It's a.

My fiduciary responsibility is to improve the overall financial health of this company.

I will do what is within my legal rights to do in order to get that end result.

Love it or hate it, that is the perspective for some of these people, that's a problem.

Proactive enforcement.

Unlike other regulators, the CFPB doesn't just react to violations.

It actively investigates and penalizes bad actors in financial services.

Absolutely.

And it also holds all three credit bureaus accountable.

Right.

It's because of the CFPB that it forces the credit bureaus to make it easier for the consumers.

Right.

For people to fight any.

Anything that's maybe an error on your credit report.

Right.

So, I mean, so there's.

There's clearly some potential consequences for consumers right out the gate.

I mean, less recourse for complaints.

I think that's probably the number one thing that people are going to miss right out the gate.

If you can't make a complaint that someone's going to listen to, then it's going into this echo chamber that nobody ever hears, and then what recourse do you have?

A company says, hey, we're not helping.

You.

Increase predatory lending.

Payday lenders being probably the one I think about the most that was such a predatory industry for a long period of time.

And I thought the CFPB made some pretty good headway.

But subprime lenders and debt collectors are also in the same category.

Very predatory businesses.

And them operating with less scrutiny scares me.

Right.

Like, I don't like the idea of debt collectors having a little more liberty now.

Right.

It's not.

It's not a very savory business.

Yeah.

They can harass you even more.

Weaker oversight on mortgages and credit cards, mortgages I'm kind of indifferent about.

I think the Dodd Frank act really cleaned a lot of that.

Those abuses up credit quality.

Credit quality is much better now than.

It was, but credit cards I got a problem with.

I mean, you got interest rates north of 28% right now.

Right.

You saw those.

The people from the.

I think it was MasterCard, Visa, that were.

That was on Capitol Hill or in front of the Senate.

They were getting grilled.

Oh, God.

Oh, my God.

That was ruthless, dude.

That was terrible.

I watched the clips and I'm like, man, that was mean.

All your profit margins somewhere around 50.

Yeah.

And the senator just looked at him.

Was like, how do you sleep at night?

Why?

Why?

Why?

Why?

Yeah, but that's exactly it.

Right.

Their fiduciary responsibility is to increase profits, is not to be moral or ethical.

Yeah.

Right.

You're returning value to your shareholders.

It's a, as I've gotten older, my, my capitalist perspective has changed.

And part of it is weird as this is to say being a dad has really changed how I think about money and business.

Yeah.

Because, yeah, God forbid you could see somebody taking advantage of your own kid one day.

It just, I, I would hope the world would be a better place for my son.

I remember back in the day when I was in college working for Wells Fargo, and back then when you would you open up the screen for a customer, there's a little green button that you'd have to click to see what kind of offers they would get, Right?

Yeah.

And they would always, undoubtedly, without fail, every time, credit card, it's always there.

Right.

And I'd get, I would get my manager that would stand behind me and say, press the green button.

Right.

And I would say, no, I don't want to, I don't want to sell this guy a credit card.

I know he's not going to manage it well.

I'm looking at the late overdraft fees over here.

This guy is not going to manage it well.

He's going to ruin his entire life with this credit card.

Yeah.

You know, it's like, no, you have to press the button.

I'm like, come on, man, this is, this is wrong.

Just press the button.

Side.

No, not going to do it.

So of course there are some natural questions about what happens next.

And I've got some hypothetical scenarios, three of them that I think are noteworthy possibilities for the CFPB.

Number one, banks and lenders welcome the CFPB's elimination traditionally since it reduces some of the regulatory pressure that they're under.

And that's not to demonize banks and lenders.

If banks and lenders have to answer like we talked about, you know, to at least three of the four, the occ, the Federal Reserve, the FDIC and or the state.

Then them having the CFPB in addition to that.

I mean, that's a lot of stress.

Right.

That's a lot of different people with their hands in a cookie jar.

Mm.

I don't have that many cookies.

I don't think a lot of people realize what that's like because when, you know, even when you're a well run institution and these agencies come in and you're getting not just like audited, but just, it's part of a, you know, annual exam.

Right.

And once you get to a certain size, they're, they're there even more often.

Yep, they're there they have an office there.

The office in your building.

In your building.

So they're there.

And you have to stop what you're doing, your normal course of business you're working on, to answer questions.

Yeah, I mean, look, it's not a contentious relationship.

No, it's not.

But it's certainly one that.

That's strange.

Now, I will say, if you've been in corporate America and you've worked for a publicly traded company, you know that there's SOX control, Sarbanes, Oxley Controls, there's auditors, because you have to file public statements, and people have to rely on those public statements in order to make investment decisions.

Because you're publicly traded.

Right.

So there are similar, like, oversight rules and restrictions in other companies that are not regulated.

But I would say that banking is probably one of the most, if not the most regulated industries out there.

Yeah.

Because people have proven that it needs to be.

Yeah, maybe.

Come on, now.

Maybe, maybe.

I mean, I'm not.

I don't have a dog in the fight.

I'm just a guy out here trying to make a dollar.

Make a dollar out of 15 cents.

That's what it is.

I'm not hitting those fuzzy knuckles.

No, I'm not gonna do it.

Last time I did, I got static electricity.

Shock.

Congress may attempt to redistribute the CFPB's functions, but that would depend on political dynamics.

So how hard is Congress going to push?

Is there a lawsuit coming?

Are they going to say, okay, fine, you don't want the cfpb, we'll redistribute this and we'll take that money and we'll allocate other places or, or what happens to what would otherwise be the money they would, they would get.

Like, you know, there's, there's, there's a lot of moving parts, politically and financially, to consider.

And Congress hasn't, other than Elizabeth Warren, hasn't indicated what they're going to do or not do.

And, of course, there is the legal, Legal road here.

And I would be remiss as an attorney to not tell you that if the courts block Trump's move to dismantle the cfpb, it could set a legal, legal precedence on executive limits.

Right now, it's well within his limits to limit their scope.

But if limiting their scope is tantamount to shutting them down, which an argument can be made here, that's what's actually happened.

As a matter of fact, shutting them down was the language that we heard at least Scott Bessette talk about.

Here at the top of the top of the show, is that going too far?

Are we going to limit a president's ability to shut down or effectively shut down an organization that has been authorized by Congress?

Because that's where the checks and balances come in.

And I think that's a strong likelihood.

I think what.

What a Supreme Court decision would likely say is a president can change the head of the organization, but he or she cannot remove funding and power and autonomy from an organization tantamount to shutting it down without effectively shutting it down.

Because you are, at the end of the day, shutting it down as a result of your choices.

Right.

Which is an overreach as far as I'm concerned, from a congressional constitutional perspective.

Now, if you're trying to be efficient and there's a greater good here, I'm not arguing that.

I'm just saying that from a checks and balances in a separation of powers, judicial, legislative and executive branch, there is a compelling argument to be made that this is an overreach by the current president, whether you like it or not, because it's tantamount to shutting the agency down.

That's my current stance on it.

I think there will be lawsuits.

I think there will be conversations.

Yeah.

As there should be.

I love the cfpb.

I'm not.

I'm not saying anybody shouldn't.

I think there's.

This is going to continue to develop, and I think it's going to rattle a lot of people in the federal government, whether they're with this agency or other agencies, and it's going to make them feel very uncomfortable.

And I can tell you, as somebody who's been in business a long time, when you rattle the foundation of somebody's paycheck and their financial wherewithal, it echoes in their humanity at home with their family around them.

It causes people to be less productive.

You're not more efficient.

If the goal is efficiency from Doge, you're communicating in a way that is ignorant of how humans act with one another.

I don't think this was done tactfully.

I don't think you send a message like this on a Saturday.

I sure don't think you follow it up on a.

On a Sunday or a Monday.

Look at a clean show and you.

Know, I ruined it.

No, but it's okay, though.

It's passion.

Like I said, this is.

This is a night.

A night.

PG 13 from the 90s.

Yeah.

This is what we're doing.

I just felt.

I felt that good or bad, right or wrong, it was communicated Horribly.

It was done to be overly politicized and driven to the media in a way that was unnecessary, intentional.

None of this had to be done this way.

Very intentional.

You could have waited.

If he got named on a Friday, he didn't have to do this on a Saturday.

Yeah, you could have had a very strategic game plan on a Monday.

And I know the argument.

I don't want people coming in on Monday.

Also.

Give it like 90 days, bro.

It's not even 90 days.

Like just find a way to communicate the message that doesn't scare everyone.

And if your goal is to scare people, then you're doing it.

Then you're doing.

You should never use fear as your motivation.

Right.

And it feels like that's what was done here.

I found it all to be handled incredibly poorly.

I, I'm not saying that the ultimate goal isn't good and that the benefit to people won't be there at the end.

I'm just saying that, that you named.

You had one, two, three people go in.

And I like Jonathan McCurd.

I think he's a stand up dude.

I think nothing but positive things to say about him.

Right.

But three people, like brought in the messaging that was sent over the weekends.

I'm sure Jonathan will clean a lot of, of what he's supposed to clean up.

And I don't know who knows what the message is, but there's certainly.

This is a tough way to start the efficiency projects.

I agree.

You look like you're done for the show tonight.

I feel the doneness in you.

It's not, it's just I'm.

When this first broke out and continuing to read up about it over the last couple days, it's very unsettling because you can't even.

You say that it's not budgeted correctly or they get too much funding or they're inefficient.

Well, show me, tell me, give me an example.

What is it?

Because all I know is they've returned over $20 billion to consumers.

Right.

And if making people feel a little bit safer, making give me a reason, like what have they done wrong?

What have they gotten wrong?

You can't point to anything.

If anything, you could.

If anything, you should say maybe they should have more of a staff to protect people, even more.

Well, I mean, okay, let's take this with grain of salt here.

I don't know enough about what they've done or not done.

I know there's been some.

They've got.

He's Rohit.

When he was in the seat at the cfpb, took some pretty aggressive stances at going after some pretty high profile, you know, companies like Chase, for example.

There's been some criticism over that behavior.

I don't know enough about what they've done and what they haven't done in the opposite side of the argument to make a case one way or the other.

I can just tell you that, that it has been a controversial agency since inception.

I don't know that it was working or not working the way they wanted it to.

But what I will say is, is I do think the idea of being a more efficient government is important.

I agree.

I was on board with DOGE to begin with.

There has to be some sacrifices somewhere.

Right?

But yeah, yeah, now do I.

Do I think this is where I would have started?

Probably not.

It comes off as you, this agency is a pain in my butt.

I want to get rid of them.

That's what it feels like.

Yeah.

I mean, and it's a pain in the butt to a lot of people that I trust.

Right.

A lot of people that I work with.

And they all, we all agree that you're a pain in our butt, not recognizing the good that's also been done.

Maybe, maybe time will tell.

You know, I think there's other agencies I would have started with personally.

I mean, there's a lot of Pentagon budget stuff, for example, that don't make a whole lot of sense.

I mean, how many audits have they failed in a row?

I mean.

Yeah, right, right there.

Look right there.

Look right there.

So I think this is probably going to be the first of many.

And, and maybe we'll look back on it and say that this wasn't the, the most stigmatized change that was made.

But as of right now, this is certainly not a good start in the way you handle humans.

And I think that that's probably the most distasteful part of this whole thing.

You know who did have a good start, though?

My boy Luca.

I didn't see that.

Did he.

Did he do well?

He did amazing.

Yeah, he did great.

We're winning the championship this year.

Why do you say we?

Like you're we.

It's me.

I'm in.

I am in.

You don't even live in la.

No, no.

Born and raised, though.

Come on.

You live in Orange County.

No, born and raised.

LA County.

Okay.

Is that okay?

Like, it sounds like adjacent you, you've left, but it's still home.

If you like LA county, why don't you go live there?

I would, but it's no, Everybody's here.

Yeah, that's not what you were gonna say.

You watered that down hard at the end.

That's shame on you.

Torrance still feels like home.

Torrance.

Torrance is a little dicey.

It sucks me.

The South Bay has some really beautiful sections and some really not so beautiful sections.

Yeah, I was South Torrance.

South Torrance.

Near Hermosa.

Redondo pv.

Yeah.

Very nice.

Very expensive.

Yeah.

Class, Class, class, class.

Yeah, no, I hear you, but I.

I think the.

The Lakers have some controversy in their future.

I don't.

Don't do this.

I signed up for YouTube TV because of you, by the way.

Yeah.

Yeah.

How you like it?

I didn't know it came with cnbc.

Of course it does.

I told you it has all the same channels.

I didn't.

I don't listen to a lot of what you said.

And it.

And it picks up on your algorithm.

It's just right there for you every time you top, like three, four channels.

Yeah, I did it for the Super Bowl.

That's how we got into this.

But you're paying $80 a month, Chris.

No, I told you, I split it with Odun.

Yeah, you could have jumped in on our plan.

I probably should have.

How many people you get on the plane?

I think like three or four.

Hey, man.

Let's do this.

I'm in for 20amonth.

You down?

Yeah, got 20 on it.

Room pay?

40.

So.

You don't work here.

You don't even know.

Yeah, exactly.

Yeah.

And no, I did not watch Super Bowl.

You said you got it for the super bowl, but you didn't watch.

My wife watched Super Bowl.

I was.

The halftime show.

I was doing.

She's into football work, huh?

Or she's into football for the halftime show.

My wife likes.

She likes to watch the game.

She.

I was putting Carter to bed while she was watching the second half.

Really?

I remember.

I mean, it wasn't much of a game, but I heard.

Yeah, I heard.

I heard her chirping in the background.

But, yeah, I was.

I was doing some work on the computer.

Yeah, I was happy.

You were?

Yeah.

Why?

Because the Eagles owns Kobe's team.

I don't have a dog.

Of the fight.

I knew this was going to upset you.

Just don't understand how.

That's your.

That's your.

That's your baseline.

That's my baseline.

I don't have a dog in the fight.

So I was like, how can I.

How can I.

Some find a way to tie this back to the Lakers?

There it Is right there.

Yeah, there's.

There was videos going viral of the last time they.

They won the super bowl.

And he was getting all giddy, and he was excited about it from Philadelphia.

Okay.

I mean.

All right, I'll give it.

I'll give it to you.

I'm not gonna.

Yeah, I'm not gonna do that.

You wanna.

You wanna go swing a hammer for a little bit?

Oh.

What?

No, we knocked down all the walls.

I know.

He did knock down all the walls.

All the dirty work is pretty much done.

I mean, obviously, everything you do now is going to be dirty, but with clean stuff, as opposed to, like, you know, fiberglass and risking death and cancer and lung issues.

But I'm pretty sure I took it.

Space looks much bigger now.

You've done good work.

I should probably say this now because I know there's a strong possibility of this happening.

I am not the world's greatest contractor.

I suck.

I still watch YouTube videos and stuff.

I should know, just because, you know, you never know what you don't remember.

Yeah.

Well, sometimes there's easier way of doing things.

Yeah.

And.

Well.

Yeah, I.

I'm not sure those walls are gonna hold up.

Stop it.

Yeah, no, they look good.

Yeah, we'll see.

Yeah, I.

I do not feel very confident in the end result at the moment.

I.

I want it to look good.

Drywall going up before flooring.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Okay.

So the floor is gonna be a floating floor anyway.

It's gonna be floating vinyl with.

So there's a sound deadening barrier that's gonna.

I will have some concrete work because I took out a wall, and the wall was into the concrete, which is stupid, but that's a whole different conversation.

So I got to do some concrete work, then lay down some sound deadening and insulation, and then it'll be a floating floor, so it'll be gapped like a quarter of an inch in the wall anyway.

And then you basically do that, and then you put on the.

The floor molding.

Yeah.

And then when you do that, then it covers that gap, and then you got a floor that can move and expand and contract with heat and temperature, which I'm gonna put it on my knee pads and doing.

You got knee pads, huh?

Yeah, that's right.

Nice.

Yeah, my.

By the way, my boy's got procedure tomorrow.

Adam.

Yeah.

What?

Yeah, the finger.

Yep.

What's going on now?

It was abnormal, so they're gonna.

They have to remove it.

How much they removing?

All of it.

How much tissue, though?

Oh, they have to decide that once they're in there.

Wow.

Yeah.

He's got to be bummed about basketball, huh?

Like, I can't even begin to tell you.

Yeah, the most important finger shooting finger.

Right hand, right hand index.

Oh, yeah.

So he's not playing for a while?

I don't know.

Hopefully.

I mean, we'll see.

It's on the side.

It's.

It's probably.

It's probably get a couple stitches.

Yeah, yeah.

You know, but did you give the whole old school, like, basketball narrative?

Now you'll be able to use your left hand a lot and practice your left hand.

Oh, I got a story to tell you.

I haven't told you what this is.

A story.

Yeah, Two championship games this past weekend.

Yeah, I saw the pictures.

He won one, lost one.

One.

Lost one.

Yeah.

Lost the first one.

Okay, okay, we got the W the second time.

Listen to this.

This is good.

You're gonna get a W.

If you're.

Still here, you deserve to listen to the story.

Okay, There you go.

It's gonna be really hard for me to keep this show PG still.

Okay.

Telling the story, so I'm gonna try my best.

This ought to be good.

First game starts at 11 o'clock.

Next game starts at 12.

We're already committed to showing up late to the second game.

I did a little tape review on the team that we're playing at 11.

I thought we were going to lose by 10, 15 points.

So I told the coach ahead of time, if we're down, can I pull Adam?

He's got to make it to another.

Another game, if that's okay with you.

He's like, totally understand.

Do it.

Start out the game.

We're up 7:2, and I'm like, oh, man, they got a shot.

Like they're really going to do this.

Adam's playing okay offensively, but the best defensive game he's ever played before.

Sliding his feet.

Well, he's the bottom, like on the 1, 3, 1 zone, back and forth, right?

Close game.

A minute left in the game.

We're up one.

Okay.

This ref.

Oh, my God.

So you're this parent now?

No, no, no, you don't understand.

I've dealt with plenty of bad refs.

This one.

I don't know what was going on.

Okay, this is very, very hard to explain.

These are second and third graders that are playing.

You're supposed to give everybody a little heads up.

Our guy got fouled shooting free throws.

We're up one.

Missed the first, second one shoots.

The second one goes in.

Ref calls off the point.

Lane violation on Somebody standing at the faithful line coming in to rebound.

There was no advantage made.

There wasn't like a rebound stepped in on a lane violation.

Why are you calling?

And usually you're supposed to say, hey, guys, be careful.

If you step over the lines again, I'm going to call a lane violation.

There was none of that.

No point given, right?

Or like.

But a lane violation for a made shot was irrelevant.

Irrelevant.

Thank you, sir.

Okay, this guy is like over 60 years old, too, okay?

Our coach can't hear because it's so loud in the gym, right?

Takes a step in and says, what was the call?

Because couldn't even hear what was going on.

It made no sense.

Immediate no, no hesitation.

Technical foul, two shots of the team right away.

Not even like, sir, please stand.

There was no issue all game.

They didn't even have an issue.

They go down, knock, knock down both free throws.

Now they're up one.

Okay, still very, very upset, right?

Moms.

All the moms going ballistic.

Crazy.

The gym is just in, going.

It's like bananas in there.

We're pressing the other team, okay?

The kid panics.

The kid on the opposing team panics, passes it to his teammate.

And by teammate, he passed it to the ref.

The ref catches the ball instead of letting it go out of bounds or saying out of bounds or calling something, catches it and just puts it right back on the floor.

They pick it up and they go down, and there goes the game.

No, no, no, he can't do that.

Game ends.

My son Adam, in absolute tear, bawling like I've never seen him cry before.

The whole team.

The whole team is crying.

And I'm telling him, now, now, mind you, he's got another game, right, that he's already late for.

That's already started.

I'm checking the app.

Someone's logging the other score of the game in real time.

I'm looking at it, five, five, nine, nine.

I'm like, oh, my God.

It's another tight game.

So we're jumping in the car.

I tell my wife, I say, go with your parents in the car.

I need to have him alone.

Like, I gotta.

I gotta, like, handle this.

We're driving over to the game.

I'm letting him feel all the emotions.

He's bawling, he's saying, why, God?

Why did.

Why did you do this to me?

Right?

And I'm just letting him feel the emotion.

It's part of it, right?

We get.

We exit.

And I have to tell him, hey, man, you got to keep it together.

Like, you Got another game right now that's tied at halftime.

You're gonna have to step in, and you're gonna have to, like, help your team win, you know?

And he's, like, changing his clothes, and he's, like, crying, you know, he steps in.

Luckily, they win that game by.

They end up winning by 20.

Not that Adam had a lot of points.

He actually only scored four points.

But just having another ball handler helped out a lot.

Right.

Because he was one of the primary ball handlers.

They ended up winning the game by 20.

Couldn't get him to smile.

He was devastated.

I get it.

Tough loss, man.

That was the one that he wanted to win.

Because in that league, they give out, like, championship rings.

I'm like, how cool is that?

How cool is that?

We've been.

Championship rings.

Yeah.

For kids.

You know how they usually give out, like, little trophies?

Yeah.

Right.

And some leagues, they only have one big trophy, and that's it.

And everybody else gets medals, which is stupid.

Yeah.

That league over there, they hand out championship rings to the kids, so they're all, like, flashing the rings.

I'm like, dude, that's so dope.

How cool is that?

I want a championship ring.

Yeah.

Yeah.

I want one for, like, work.

Yeah, I know.

Yeah.

We should be handing out championship rings.

Chris, good job today.

Here's your championship ring.

You know, one of those.

That's the move.

Yeah.

Walk around the office.

Employee of the month.

Yeah.

Big ring.

Big ring.

You can keep your upfront parking spot.

Yeah.

I don't want your.

I want the ring.

I want a big bow tie.

Yeah.

That everybody just has to look at.

Yeah.

What's that, Chris?

My championship bow tie.

Yeah.

I got a rule, man.

Bow tie only on the.

Only on your wedding day.

What?

Yeah.

I just want to work all the time.

Bow ties.

That's where I'm all the time to work.

One time.

One time only for me.

Wedding day.

That was in my.

I'm arguing if you want to dress me like a clown, I'm gonna act like a clown face.

So I did that.

Yeah.

Wore a lot of really bright colors in bow ties.

No one said anything for the longest time.

There's like, wow, this guy's.

And then finally, someone is like, what's going on with you?

He's hip to it.

Yeah.

I think for a while, people are like, oh, he's just a hipster.

Yeah.

That's all that is.

That's all it is.

Yeah.

I'm like, yeah, My hips are, like, dressed as, like, clowns.

It's fine.

That's fine.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Anyways, so.

Yeah.

Maybe.

Maybe a break for the boy in basketball will be good for him for a little bit.

Yeah, probably good.

Yeah.

For his emotional stability.

Yeah, exactly.

Yeah.

Well, there's more life.

Yeah.

Let's.

Let's read some books, play some video games.

Let's.

Yeah, let's read some books, play some video games.

Yeah.

There you go.

Yeah.

Everybody wins today.

He's.

He's.

He's really getting into history.

Good, man.

I'm gonna come over to my house.

I teach him all about archeology.

Really?

Oh, he'll love that.

He asked me.

He's like, dad, in the car today.

He goes, can you tell me about the Chicago Fire?

Like, just.

I'm like, first of all, that's a weird conversation starter.

Right.

Second of all, I can just.

Let me go home first and ask Alexa.

Like, Jesus.

Well, most of Chicago got burned down with this massive fire sign.

Yeah.

That's what you need to know.

You see what happened to the Palisades.

Yeah.

So.

Too soon?

No, but I'm saying that, like, that's.

That's like that, but, you know, with all wood buildings.

Yes.

Which was entirely Chicago.

All Chicago.

Yeah.

So.

Yeah.

All right.

Let's call it a rap.

Nobody cares anymore.

Nobody cares.

All right.

Love you, man.

I love you.

Good night, everybody.

Okay, bye.