It’s round three for GameStop Corp. in the House Financial Services Committee. The panel will meet on Thursday for the hearing. (The Senate is out this week). Why it’s worth watching: This time, the Securities and Exchange Commission’s new head, Gary Gensler, will testify. 

It’s Gensler’s first appearance in Congress since his confirmation hearing, and it could be some of the first real insight we get into the Washington fallout from the GameStop trading frenzy. In his confirmation hearing, Gensler promised to analyze the “gamification” of stock trading and acknowledged issues with payment for order flow (where trading firms like Citadel Securities pay companies like Robinhood to send them traders’ orders to execute). He said the SEC would “look at market structure in the equity markets around payment for order flow when frankly just a couple – a handful – of financial firms are buying most of the retail flow in America.”

There’s a big slate of speakers at the National Community Reinvestment Coalition’s Just Economy conference on Monday and Tuesday. Why it’s worth watching: Fed Chairman Jay Powell and Secretary of Housing and Urban Development will speak on Monday. Sens. Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio) and Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) are scheduled for Tuesday. 

The NCRC is a key voice in the Community Reinvestment Act, which will likely be addressed by financial regulators during the Biden administration after the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency’s go–it-alone attempt last year. Housing is a big part of that, and Brown has vowed to make housing a central part of his tenure as the Senate Banking Committee’s head. 

Friday is jobs day. Why it’s worth watching: With unemployment claims falling and businesses beginning to reopen, we’re expecting to see at least some job gains. How steep those gains are will be a big indicator for the folks at the Fed as they consider any policy shifts.  

We’re expecting the Fed’s financial stability report on Thursday. Why it’s worth watching: It’s the first time the Fed will weigh in on financial stability during the Biden administration. The Fed will likely continue its analysis of the Treasurys meltdown last year (in its November report, the central bank found that hedge funds reportedly exacerbated the turmoil). The Fed is also tracking leveraged loans and corporate debt, and it will likely further explain how Fed intervention earlier in the pandemic impacted markets. 

Anyone have jobs day predictions? What do you think the Fed will call out in its report? Let me know; my Twitter and email info are right under my byline at the top of the newsletter. 

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• Brian Miller, Special Inspector General for Pandemic Recovery, wrote in a report to Congress that his efforts to investigate Paycheck Protection Program fraud were thwarted by Treasury Department officials, resulting in “permanently reduced oversight of these programs.” The Department of Justice’s Office of Legal Counsel delivered an opinion earlier that those PPP programs didn’t fall under Miller’s jurisdiction, siding with Treasury officials over Miller, a former White House lawyer during the Trump administration.
• Speaking at Berkshire Hathaway Inc.’s annual meeting, Warren Buffett said that the U.S. economy is running in “super high gear” due to government stimulus packages and the Federal Reserve’s monetary policy, besting his own predictions earlier in the pandemic. Berkshire’s first-quarter operating profit climbed 20 percent to roughly $7 billion, with net income including investments totaling $11.7 billion.
• President Joe Biden made his big pitch for the American Families Plan in his first address to a joint session of Congress. Provisions include an expanded role for the federal government that would bring about a raft of social proposals including child care, paid leave, two years of free community college and higher taxes on the wealthiest Americans and corporations. Biden is also planning to increase the Internal Revenue’s budget and give it more authority to perform more audits, particularly of wealthy Americans. 
• Alex Oh was appointed to head enforcement for the Securities for Exchange Commission, then resigned days later after a judge challenged her work for Exxon Mobil Corp. Oh was the first big hire by Gensler. 
• No interest rate changes after the Federal Reserve’s Federal Open Markets Committee meeting. Powell painted an optimistic picture of the economy’s recovery but stressed that the central bank will need more data before it considers any policy changes. 

184%

The growth in fintech complaints to the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau in the first three months of 2021, compared to the same period last year. 

1) Biden’s $4 Trillion Economic Plan, in One Chart

Alicia Parlapiano, The New York Times

2) The Number of Fintech Consumer Complaints Filed to the CFPB Exploded in the Beginning of 2021

Claire Williams, Morning Consult

3) Wall Street’s Trillion-Dollar ESG Club Comes With Huge Tax Perks

Max Abelson and Lananh Nguyen, Bloomberg

4) New SEC Enforcement Director Alex Oh Resigns, Agency Says

Dave Michaels, The Wall Street Journal

5) White House says capital gains tax rise will hit only richest 0.3%

James Politi, Financial Times

6) How Biden Would ‘Step Up’ Taxes on Inheritances

Allyson Versprille, Bloomberg 

7) The Fed helped fuel a stock market boom that benefited wealthy Americans — and left behind everyone else

Allan Sloan and Cezary Podkul, The Washington Post

8) White House proposes $1.8 trillion package that would dramatically expand education, safety net programs

Jeff Stein et al., The Washington Post

9) How the middle class became downwardly mobile

Simon Kuper, Financial Times

10) The strange case of the ‘$100m deli’ and the universities that own a slice

Mark Vandevelde, Financial Times

• Is the U.S. Student Loan Program Facing a $500 Billion Hole? One Banker Thinks So. (The Wall Street Journal) 
• The S.E.C. delays a long-awaited decision on whether to allow a Bitcoin fund. (The New York Times) 
• JPMorgan calls US bankers back to the office from July (Financial Times) 
• Centrist Senators Signal Progress on Infrastructure Talks (The Wall Street Journal)