The financial regulatory agencies today issued a proposed rule to implement a section of the S. 2155 regulatory reform law that grants an exemption from the Volcker Rule for community banks. To qualify for the exemption, community banks and their controlling entities must have $10 billion or less in total consolidated assets as well as trading assets and liabilities of 5 percent or less of total consolidated assets.
Because the exemption became effective upon the law’s implementation, the agencies in June said that they would no longer enforce the Volcker Rule for those banks while waiting for the rulemaking to be finalized.