Executive Order 14406: Restoring Integrity to America's Financial System

What does Executive Order 14406 do?

The text directs Treasury to coordinate implementation review, and Financial regulators to review guidance, examinations and enforcement practices.

Reading the operative provisions of Executive Order 14406

EO 14406 directs financial regulators to review supervisory, enforcement and market practices that the administration describes as politicized, inconsistent or harmful to lawful customers. It asks agencies to identify concerns involving access to banking and financial services and consider corrective action. The Federal Register text assigns review tasks; its stated characterizations are administration positions, not findings that a specific regulator or bank violated the law.

Regulators supervise institutions for safety, compliance and consumer protection. A review may examine examination procedures, enforcement decisions or guidance, but agencies must use the authority Congress gave them and protect confidential supervisory information. Banks also must apply sanctions, anti-money-laundering and fraud controls. Fair access does not mean a regulator can require a bank to accept every customer regardless of lawful risk.

The order follows EO 14331 on fair banking and should be read alongside later regulations and agency actions. An internal review or announced investigation is not a final finding. To evaluate results, examine published rules, supervisory guidance, enforcement decisions and evidence of how customers were treated. This separates the order’s broad concerns from a specific, legally established violation.

The earlier EO 14331 specifically addressed reputation-risk criteria in bank supervision; EO 14406 broadens the review to additional financial-system practices. The two orders set policy priorities, but an agency must still publish any binding change through the appropriate process. A review should identify the conduct examined, the evidence supporting a concern and the corrective step taken. Without that record, a broad claim of politicized enforcement remains an allegation or policy judgment.