The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) recently released its annual fair lending report, covering its fair lending activities in calendar year 2025, as well as certain 2026 actions it considered particularly relevant and important.
The report reflects changes to the CFPB’s fair lending program, many in response to Trump administration executive orders, to streamline its fair lending activities by focusing on “proven, intentional racial discrimination with actual identifiable victims.” Specifically, the report highlights the CFPB’s sharper focus on intent-based discrimination claims while retreating from disparate impact theory liability, along with its shift in supervisory and enforcement priorities to debanking concerns. The report also described a series of rulemakings designed to narrow and clarify obligations under the Equal Credit Opportunity Act (ECOA).
Overview of fair lending efforts
The report details the CFPB’s efforts across supervision, enforcement and rulemaking to narrow the scope of its fair lending activities and refocus its efforts away from priorities of other administrations. These efforts are summarized below and have previously been covered in other Finsights posts.
Supervision and enforcement efforts
The CFPB indicates that during the reporting period it “redirected” its supervision efforts consistent with its new priorities. It reports closing 76% of its supervisory actions during the year (almost 1,500 matters in total), of which roughly 12% touched on fair lending.
The CFPB also notes that it neither launched new fair lending supervisory activity nor cited any institutions for fair lending violations, although the report states that the 10 other federal agencies with administrative enforcement responsibilities under ECOA (together, agencies) collectively reported citing 140 institutions with violations of ECOA, Regulation B or both.
The CFPB also reported making no ECOA referrals to the Department of Justice (DOJ) in 2025, and none of the 11 agencies, including the CFPB, brought a public enforcement action for an ECOA violation.
Reversal of prior enforcement actions
The CFPB details its efforts to terminate or dismiss a number of enforcement actions that it characterizes as examples of “overreach.” For example, in March 2025, it moved to vacate its own 2024 consent order and return the $100,000 penalty collected from a mortgage lender, arguing that the underlying investigation targeted the company’s protected speech rather than actual lending discrimination. Although the court denied that motion in June 2025, the CFPB cited the case as an example of the prior administration’s overreach. The report also noted that, after it dismissed its own ECOA claims, a court dismissed a case brought against a mortgage lender and affiliated land development.
Debanking
The CFPB described its efforts to eradicate unlawful debanking in response to President Donald Trump’s August 2025 executive order, “Guaranteeing Fair Banking for All Americans.” The CFPB removed from its examination manual and other supervisory materials any mentions of “reputation risk” and other concepts it believed could be used to justify debanking. It also reviewed consumer complaints and supervisory and enforcement data for indicia of debanking, paying particular attention to compliance with ECOA and the Fair Credit Reporting Act’s adverse action notice requirements, as well as to allegations of religious discrimination. The CFPB says it is coordinating this work with the DOJ through DOJ’s Equal Access to Banking Task Force.
Ending disparate impact
In response to Executive Order 14281, “Restoring Equality of Opportunity and Meritocracy,” the CFPB terminated its reliance on the theory of disparate impact liability in supervising and enforcing fair lending laws. The CFPB also closed open exams and investigations that relied on the disparate impact theory of liability and terminated prior consent orders premised on that theory.
In a significant rulemaking, the CFPB formally amended Regulation B by removing the “effects test” from its text and commentary and replacing it with language affirming that ECOA does not support disparate impact claims.
Changes to special purpose credit programs
Consistent with Executive Order 14173, “Ending Illegal Discrimination and Restoring Merit-Based Opportunity,” the CFPB stopped consulting with institutions on special purpose credit programs (SPCPs) built around race, color, national origin or sex. The CFPB rescinded a December 2020 advisory opinion related to certain aspects of SPCPs designed and implemented by for-profit organizations to meet special social needs, and, together with other federal agencies, rescinded a 2022 interagency statement on SPCPs in August 2026. Its final rule amending Regulation B also added new prohibitions and conditions for SPCPs.
Rulemakings and guidance
In addition to finalizing amendments to Regulation B, in May 2026, the CFPB finalized its rule implementing Section 1071 of the Dodd‑Frank Act, which requires data collection and reporting on loan applications to address funding gaps facing women-owned, minority-owned and small businesses. The CFPB also withdrew 67 guidance documents, including seven related to fair lending.
What’s next
The 2025 fair lending report confirms a deliberate and comprehensive shift toward a narrower, intent-based enforcement model, as seen in the wave of terminated consent orders, dismissed litigation and deregulatory rulemaking on Regulation B and section 1071. Lenders should expect federal fair lending supervision and enforcement to remain comparatively quiet in the near term, with the CFPB continuing to prioritize debanking concerns and clear-cut, intentional discrimination claims over statistical disparate impact theories.
State attorneys general and state banking regulators, however, remain focused on fair lending and continue to recognize disparate impact theory under their own statutes. Therefore, institutions operating across multiple states should not read the federal pullback as reducing their overall fair lending compliance exposure. Whether this federal approach persists will likely depend heavily on the priorities of future administrations and any changes in CFPB leadership.