William Michael Cunningham Files Amicus Brief in Met Life v FSOC (16-5086)

WASHINGTON - July 3, 2016 - PRLog -- On June 16, 2016, the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit recognized WIlliam Michael Cunningham as a "Friend of the Court" in Met Life vs. the Financial Stability Oversight Council (FSOC), Case Number 16-5086, "MetLife's challenge to its designation as a systemically important financial institution (SIFI) under Dodd-Frank."

On June 30th, Mr. Cunningham filed his Amicus Brief in this matter.

Mr. Cunningham holds an MA in Economics and an MBA in Finance, both from the University of Chicago. On November 16, 1995, he launched one of the first investment advisor websites. As a friend of the Court, Mr. Cunningham provides independent, objective and unbiased testimony in support of the public interest.

In his Brief, Mr. Cunningham shows that the Financial Stability Oversight Council (FSOC) "refused to offer a numerical basis for the systemically important financial institution (SIFI) determination because the FSOC lacks the technical skills to fully enumerate reputational and transaction costs and simply assumed Petitioner Met Life would wait until this skill had been developed. After all, this is a skill Met Life also lacks."

The Brief notes that "practices and policies that increase trust and thereby reduce transaction costs, like those the Respondent attempted to impose, will restore functionality to the financial and economic marketplace. These will also help prevent a reoccurrence of the financial crisis."

The Brief concludes with the observation that "it makes perfect sense to designate as potentially risky a relatively small set of institutions who are in a position to cause significant damage to the country's financial system until the FSOC develops a methodology to more accurately assess both the potential cost and the potential benefit of the designation at issue. A cautious, prescriptive approach, so widely heralded when used to classify young black men as potential predators, surely is appropriate when reviewing large financial institutions with an actual history of predatory behavior. Public policy makers have a responsibility to avoid a repeat of the financial crisis and a responsibility to protect all of the people, not just the wealthy and the white. Any refusal to do so is a violation of the Equal Protection Clause."

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Twitter: @CreativeInv

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