A Treasury office tasked with monitoring market risks is losing its chairman ahead of schedule.
Office of Financial Research Director Richard Berner plans to leave the agency at end of the year, about a year before his term expires in January 2019. He said in a statement he wants to be closer to his family.
Berner helped establish the Office of Financial Research, or OFR, under the Obama administration. Created in response to the 2008 financial crisis, the office was supposed to spot threats to the financial markets and help lawmakers mitigate those threats.
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The OFR was authorized as part of the 2010 Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform law, which imposed stricter regulations on large banks in an attempt to avoid another financial meltdown.
But now many Republicans are looking to roll back the act, which they see as a regulatory burden. The House of Representatives voted for a bill to loosen or eliminate many of the rules associated with it in June. There's now a bipartisan bill in the Senate with similar aims.
The Trump administration ordered a review of Dodd-Frank in February and has called for less financial regulation. The vacancy at the OFR could give President Donald Trump an opportunity to appoint someone who shares those sentiments.
