OCC’s Walsh Says Credit-Rating Ban May Block Basel III

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The Dodd-Frank Act ban on references to credit ratings in financial-industry rules should be amended to keep it from blocking adoption of international capital and liquidity standards, a top banking regulator told lawmakers.

“Precluding undue or exclusive reliance on credit ratings, rather than imposing an absolute bar to their use, would strike a more appropriate balance,” John Walsh, the acting Comptroller of the Currency, said in testimony prepared for a Senate hearing today on the financial-regulation overhaul enacted last year.