Office of Financial Research

Updated on Nov 08, 2023

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Employees 275 (2012)

Formed July 21, 2010; 6 years ago (2010-07-21) Jurisdiction Federal government of the United States Headquarters 717 14th Street, NW Washington, DC 20005 Annual budget US$47.7 million (FY 2015) Agency executive Richard Berner, Director

The Office of Financial Research (OFR) is an independent bureau within the United States Department of the Treasury that was established by the Dodd–Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act, whose passage in 2010 was a legislative response to the financial crisis of 2007–08 and the subsequent Great Recession. Established as a department within the Treasury, the Office is tasked with providing administrative, technical, budget analysis and other support services to the Council and its affiliated agencies.

Director

The Director of the Office of Financial Research is appointed for a 6-year term. To the extent that her or his duties are exclusively focused on the Council and the Office of Financial Research, the Director is in effect the executive director of the Council. The Director, in consultation with the Chairman of the Council (who is the Secretary of the Treasury) proposes the annual budget of the Office. The Director may set salaries of the Office’s employees “without regard to chapter 51 or subchapter III of chapter 53 of Title 5 of the United States Code, relating to classification of positions and General Schedule pay rates”.

Authority

The Director has Subpoena power and may require from any financial institution (bank or non-bank) any data needed to carry out the functions of the office.

Responsibilities

Section of the Dodd-Frank Act charged the Office of Financial Research with supporting the Financial Stability Oversight Council and member agencies by:

Collecting data on behalf of the Council, and providing such data to the Council and member agencies;
Standardizing the types and formats of data reported and collected;
Performing applied research and essential long-term research;
Developing tools for risk measurement and monitoring;
Performing other related services;
Making the results of the activities of the Office available to financial regulatory agencies; and
Assisting Council member agencies in determining the types and formats of data authorized by the Act to be collected by the member agencies.

Workforce development

The Office has broad latitude in performing support services for both the Council and other Member Agencies, including data collection, applied research and essential long-term research, and developing tools for monitoring risk. The Office can also issue guidelines to standardizing the way data is reported, constituent agencies have three years to implement data standardization guidelines. In many ways, the Office of Financial Research is to be operated without the constraints of the Civil Service system. For example, it does not need to follow federal pay scale guidelines (see above), and it is mandated that the office have:

Training and Workforce Development Plan that includes training, leadership development and succession planning

Workplace Flexibility Plan that includes telework, flexible work schedules, job sharing, parental leave benefits and childcare assistance, domestic partner benefits

Recruitment and Retention Plan

Temporary management reporting

For a period of five years after enactment, the Office shall submit an annual report to the Senate Committee on Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs, and the House Committee on Financial Services, what amounts to a management report, including:

Training And Workforce Development Plan – that includes:

Identification of skill and technical expertise needs and action taken to meet the requirements

Steps taken to foster innovation and creativity

Leadership development and succession Planning

Effective use of technology by employees

Workplace Flexibility Plan – that includes:

Telework

Flexible work schedules

Phased retirement

Reemployment annuitants

Part-time work

Job sharing

Parental leave benefits and childcare assistance

Domestic partner benefits

Other workplace flexibilities

Recruitment and Retention Plan – that includes:

The steps necessary to target highly qualified applicant pools with diverse backgrounds

Streamlined employment application process

Timely notification of employment applications

Measures of hiring effectiveness

Data and Research & Analysis Centers

The Office is supported by two entities:

The Data Center, which collects, validates and maintains (and publishes some of) the data required to support the Council; which may be obtained from commercial data providers, publicly available data sources and the financial entities supervised by state and federal agencies; and

The Research and Analysis Center, which conducts independent analysis of available information to identify financially destabilizing effects, and develops and maintains independent analytical capabilities and computing resources to:

Develop and maintain metrics and reporting systems for risks to the financial stability of the United States

Monitor, investigate, and report on changes in systemwide risk levels and patterns to the Council and Congress

Conduct, coordinate, and sponsor research to support and improve regulation of financial entities and markets

Evaluate and report on stress tests or other stability-related evaluations of financial entities overseen by the member agencies

Maintain expertise in such areas as may be necessary to support specific requests for advice and assistance from financial regulators

Investigate disruptions and failures in the financial markets, report findings, and make recommendations to the Council based on those findings;

Conduct studies and provide advice on the impact of policies related to systemic risk; and

Promote best practices for financial risk management.

Reporting

The Director reports to and testifies before only the Senate Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs and the House Committee on Financial Services of the House of Representatives. Testimony shall be annual on the activities of the Office, including the work of the Data Center and the Research and Analysis Center and the assessment of significant financial and market developments and potential emerging threats to the financial stability of the Country. These reports to Congress are independent of any political influence in that "No officer or agency of the United States shall have any authority to require the Director to submit the testimony ... for approval, comment, or review prior to the submission of such testimony."

References

Office of Financial Research Wikipedia

(Text) CC BY-SA

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