Mr. FRANK of Massachusetts. Madam Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Madam Speaker, this is an example of sensible regulation because sensible regulation includes deregulation when that is appropriate.

The Committee on Financial Services reported this bill out last year. It passed the House. Surprisingly it managed not to make it through
the Senate. The efficiency of that body failed us on this occasion apparently, but we are going to try again.

We believe in regulation, and this is an important area where we provide information to our financial detectives, and it is especially
important with regard to terrorist financing.

But too much regulation can defeat the purpose for which regulation is intended, and we have a situation now where the banks are required to
report every year on customers' transactions of $10,000 or more. Now, one of the things this bill would do is give the Secretary of the
Treasury the authority to increase a dollar figure that has been left unadjusted for inflation for too long.

More importantly, we are talking now about the exemption that is given to what we call seasoned customers of the bank. When the banks are
dealing, and this is particularly important for our community bankers, when they are dealing with people whom they know, with whom they have
had regular and continuing relationships, having to report every time they do a transaction of $10,000 or more generates extra work for the
bank, and I believe, if anything, interferes with the ability of the regulators to find what they should be looking for.

If we are telling people to find needles, we should not set about building them bigger haystacks. What this bill says is that where we
are talking about regular customers, regular seasoned customers, they can apply for the exemption, which is in the control of the Secretary of the Treasury, with careful criteria.

And having received that exemption, as long as they remain seasoned customers of the same bank, that process does not have to be repeated
every 2 years. It reduces the regulatory burden on banks, and it is particularly important to small banks.