Sip slowly, this explainer was hard to write. There is a considerable amount of perplexed frustration following on the heels of Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin testifying to the Senate Banking Committee earlier today and specifically saying:
02:20 Glass-Steagall? “we do not support a separation of banks from investment banks, we think that would have a very significant problem on the financial markets, on the economy, on liquidity; and we think that there is proper things that potentially we could look at around regulation, but we do not support a separation of banks and investment banks.”
That statement runs counter to the Trump administration’s prior policy statements outlining a preference for a reinstatement of some form of “Glass-Steagall” regulatory separation between commercial banking and investment banking.
In essence when combined with the totality of Mnuchin’s testimony before the committee, Mnuchin is saying the current “too big to fail” (‘too big to succeed’) issue has created a problem for lending liquidity. Specifically, if divisional separation is required – the banks best interests would naturally put the investment division ahead of commercial lending and the liquid capital within the overall economy would shrink.
I think we have a handle on what the administration is doing based on the executive orders signed and explained earlier. Bear with me…




