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Daniel Tarullo

  • A person walks by a closed SVB branch entrance.

    Bailouts for everyone?

    March 16, 2023

    Daniel Tarullo, who served as a Fed regulator, discusses the moral hazard and the implications for inflation after the SVB collapse rocks Washington and Wall Street.

  • Federal Reserve and Lawmakers Eye Bank Rules After Collapse

    March 16, 2023

    The Federal Reserve is facing criticism over Silicon Valley Bank’s collapse, with lawmakers and financial regulation experts asking why the regulator failed to catch and…

  • Was Silicon Valley Bank — the 16th largest US bank — really too big to fail?

    March 15, 2023

    An op-ed by Daniel Tarullo: The repercussions of the Silicon Valley Bank failure are still rippling through the financial system. While much remains to be…

  • Former Fed official who oversaw reforms sees “deep irony” after bank collapse

    March 15, 2023

    Nowadays, Daniel Tarullo teaches at Harvard Law School. But not too long ago, he was leading the charge on bank regulation. Between 2009 and 2017,…

  • Powell’s Legacy Risks Being Tarnished More by SVB Collapse

    March 15, 2023

    The collapse of Silicon Valley Bank threatens to further besmirch the reputation of Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell, on top of the blemish he’s suffered…

  • They warned in 2018 that weakening regulations could lead to failure like SVB. Now Elizabeth Warren and other Democrats want those changes back.

    March 14, 2023

    On Monday, a day after federal regulators stepped in to stem a potential crisis triggered by two sudden bank failures, Senator Elizabeth Warren was seething.

  • Where Were the Regulators as SVB Crashed?

    March 13, 2023

    Silicon Valley Bank’s failure boils down to a simple misstep: It grew too fast using borrowed short-term money from depositors who could ask to be…

  • SVB, Signature Bank Depositors to Get All Their Money as Fed Moves to Stem Crisis

    March 13, 2023

    U.S. regulators took control of a second bank Sunday and announced emergency measures to ease fears depositors might pull their money from smaller lenders after…

  • Tarullo on Powell’s Speech in Jackson Hole

    August 29, 2022

    Daniel Tarullo, former Federal Reserve Board Governor and Harvard Law School Professor, joined “Bloomberg Markets: European Close” with Kailey Leinz and Guy Johnson following Fed…

  • Close up of woman taking money out of a wallet

    Fed up with inflation

    January 24, 2022

    Former Federal Reserve Bank member Daniel Tarullo says the Fed has “fallen behind the curve” in raising interest rates to help tame rising inflation and “needs to play some catch-up.”

  • Close up shot of twenty dollars bills

    A rising tide?

    August 3, 2021

    Harvard Law Professor and Federal Reserve Board veteran Daniel K. Tarullo discusses inflation and the United States’ economic recovery.

  • Grid of student headshots, one man and three women.

    Salzburg Cutler Fellows forge online connections

    May 18, 2021

    The ninth annual Salzburg Cutler Fellows Program brought together 53 law students from across the U.S., including four from Harvard Law School, to explore the future of public and private international law.

  • Bloomberg Wall Street Week: Romer, Tarullo, Finucane

    November 16, 2020

    One of the most iconic brands in financial television returns for today's issues and today's world. This week's Wall Street Week features David Westin's interviews with Bank of America COO Tom Montag, Bank of America Vice Chairman Anne Finucane, Former Federal Reserve Board Governor Dan Tarullo and Nobel Laureate Paul Romer. The conversations highlight President-elect Biden's economic priorities, the consequences of the surge in Covid-19 cases, and the role of ESG during a pandemic. Willett Advisors Chairman & CEO Steve Rattner and Former Treasury Secretary Lawrence H. Summers analyze whether markets are getting ahead of themselves on vaccine optimism.

  • Fed Limits Bank Payouts and Suspends Share Buybacks as Pandemic Grinds On

    June 26, 2020

    The Federal Reserve on Thursday temporarily restricted shareholder payouts by the nation’s biggest banks, barring them from buying back their own stocks or increasing dividend payments in the third quarter as regulators try to ensure banks remain strong enough to keep lending through the pandemic-induced downturn. The decision to limit payouts is an admission by the Fed that large financial institutions, while far better off than they were in the financial crisis, remain vulnerable to an economic downturn unlike any other in modern history. With virus cases across the United States still surging and business activity subdued, it remains unclear when and how robustly the economy will recover. Some of the Fed’s own loss projections for banks, in fact, suggest that the eventual hit to loans in a bad scenario could be far worse than in the aftermath of 2008...Others felt that the Fed could have gone further to shore up the financial system. Officials could have placed formal restrictions on shareholder payouts earlier in the coronavirus crisis, and the decision to do so now is a sign that regulators believe the financial system could face threats if the downturn drags on. But the fact that the Fed’s demands are not stricter could limit the amount of buffer that banks have on hand to absorb losses and make loans to households and companies should borrowers struggle to repay debts over the coming months. “A lot of this seems to be about preserving options,” said Daniel Tarullo, a former Fed governor and the original architect of much of the stress-testing regime who is now at Harvard. “That’s inconsistent with the idea of acting early in response to a major shock.”

  • How the Fed responds to crisis

    March 4, 2020

    The Federal Reserve announced Tuesday morning it’s making an emergency half percentagepoint rate cut, as fears continue to mount about the global spread of COVID-19. Marketplace host Kai Ryssdal spoke to Daniel Tarullo, a former member of the Federal Reserve’s Board of Governors and professor at Harvard Law School, about what the central bank’s decision process may have been like. “The mood was probably a fairly somber one,” Tarullo said. “I suspect a lot of preliminary discussions were held last week.” Despite the rate cut, the Dow fell 700 points today. Tarullo said the market reaction implies that the Fed’s announcement may have further worried people about the severity of COVID-19.

  • Detail of Austin Hall

    Leading scholars bring new expertise

    February 2, 2020

    Effective Jan. 1, three faculty members were promoted and two new scholars joined the HLS faculty.

  • Daniel Tarullo

    Daniel Tarullo joins Harvard Law faculty as the Nomura Professor of International Financial Regulatory Practice

    January 28, 2020

    Daniel Tarullo, a former governor of the Federal Reserve Board, was appointed the Nomura Professor of International Financial Regulatory Practice.

  • Fed risks creating an environment for another financial crisis, ex-officials say

    December 18, 2019

    The Federal Reserve is running the risk of fomenting an eventual financial crisis by easing banking regulations at the same time that it’s cut interest rates. So say some former Fed officials, including ex-Vice Chairman Alan Blinder and financial stability experts Daniel Tarullo and Nellie Liang. They worry that the combination of looser credit and laxer rules will prompt financial institutions and investors to pile on leverage and take excessive risks. While that may spur economic growth in the short run, it could end up triggering a recession once the speculative bets are unwound...Fed leadership though has pushed back hard against suggestions it has made the financial system more vulnerable by loosening regulations, arguing that the capital requirements of the biggest banks remain as tough as ever...Former Fed Governor Daniel Tarullo is not so sure. He zeroed in on the stress tests, including the disclosure of more information about the models behind them. “I suspect quite strongly that the effective amount of capital the banks have to have for a given portfolio is lower because they have so much more information about the stress tests,” said Tarullo, who was the Fed’s point man on regulation after the 2008 crisis and is now at the Harvard Law School.