LEADING THE WEEK

After a couple of relatively light weeks, driven in large part by the fact that it has seemed like the House and the Senate have rarely been in session at the same time during the past month, this past week saw an explosion of activity.

While the most important, and simultaneously the most fluid story of the past week has been the Biden Deficit Reduction talks and the (depending who you speak to) (a) unanticipated, or (b) expected departure of House Majority Leader Cantor, there certainly was a lot of other newsworthy items that happened which will impact both the financial services industry specifically, but also corporate America generally during this past week.

Earlier in the week, the Senate Banking Committee waded into the ever-increasing problem of corporate cybersecurity and privacy with a hearing that was largely a response to the news that Citigroup had been hacked. This hearing was another in a long line of data security hearings this year, as Congress actively considers how to deal with these complicated issues. There is legislation in both the House and Senate, which, if enacted, could impose new regulatory burdens on businesses not accustomed to dealing with the heavy hand of federal regulation.