Contact: Maren Hurley-Matz, Equal Justice Works Legal Fellow, New Economy Project, 332-222-7312, maren@neweconomyproject.org

Charter Application Withdrawal Follows Months of Organized Opposition to Attempts by High-Cost Lenders to Obtain National Bank Charters to Circumvent State Interst Rate Protections.

NEW YORK, NY — The Stop Taking Our Pay Coalition, a broad based alliance of civil rights organizations, community groups, community development credit unions, and faith leaders from the 21 states that ban payday lending, celebrates the announcement that predatory payday lender Enova International has withdrawn its bid to become a national bank, following strong opposition from coalition members and state Attorneys General.

High-cost lenders are increasingly seeking to acquire national banks or obtain national bank charters to evade state interest rate caps. Acquiring a national bank would have allowed Enova to claim it was not subject to state interest rate caps and unleash triple-digit-interest loans that target Black and brown communities in states that have long banned payday lending.

Dozens of groups from the payday loan-free states coordinated a unified campaign calling on regulators to scrutinize Enova’s long history of exploiting communities of color and low-income people with exorbitantly high-interest loans. 

“We are proud to stand against fintech lenders’ attempts to circumvent the strongest state protections against predatory lending. We know that the 125 million people living in our states are better off without predatory payday loans that trap working people in debt,” said Maren Hurley-Matz, Equal Justice Works Fellow at New Economy Project, which coordinates the STOP Coalition.

The STOP Coalition is now calling on regulators at the OCC, the FDIC, and the Federal Reserve to reject notorious predatory lender Opportunity Financial’s national bank acquisition.