Quick overview

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Citigroup, the first major Wall Street bank to loosen regulations for its customers who sold firearms. The company stated, “We will also no longer have a specific policy as it relates to firearms.”. The policy did not address firearm manufacturing; it encouraged best sales practices as prudent risk management.

 

A right-wing talking point since over a dozen state auditors accused Bank of America of “politicizing de-banking” in an open letter last year (de-banking is when a bank closes an account for a customer it deems high risk), the decision comes as the Trump administration claims that Wall Street is biased against conservatives. Bank of America stated it had “no political litmus test.”.

Citi stated it was “monitoring federal legislation, recent Executive Orders, and regulatory developments.”

Citi announced that it would stop providing banking services to companies that sold firearms to people under the age of 21 in 2018, to people who failed background checks, or to companies that sold high-capacity magazines or bump stocks, which were used by the shooter in the 2017 Las Vegas mass shooting.

The policy did not limit how individual customers used their cards, but it did apply to small businesses, commercial and institutional clients, and credit card partners. Recently, the president and the cryptocurrency industry have battled big banks.

 Bank of America CEO Brian Moynihan received a reprimand from President Donald Trump at the annual World Economic Forum in January. “You did a great job, but I hope you start letting conservatives work in your bank because a lot of conservatives complain that banks don’t let them do business with them,” Trump stated. “