Powell Takes Wall Street Oversight Reins From Departing Tarullo

(Bloomberg) -- The duties of aggressive Wall Street regulator Daniel Tarullo have been taken over for now by Federal Reserve Governor Jerome Powell, a former Republican-administration Treasury official who was once a partner at investment giant Carlyle Group.

Powell's assignment to head the Committee on Supervision and Regulation gives him authority over the Fed division that's responsible for writing banking rules, overseeing Wall Street and issuing enforcement actions. However, the responsibilities will likely be temporary as the agency awaits President Donald Trump's selection of a Fed vice chairman of banking supervision.

The administration expects to announce Fed governor nominees in the “very near future,” Gary Cohn, Trump's chief economic adviser, said Friday in a Bloomberg Television interview.

Meanwhile, Powell -- along with the supervision committee's other member, Governor Lael Brainard -- will oversee the Fed work that gave Tarullo a reputation as one of the industry's toughest regulators in his eight-year tenure.

Tarullo Departure

Tarullo's departure this week leaves three openings on the seven-member board, so the remaining governors are spread thin across the new committee assignments. Powell is now chairman of half of the board's eight committees.

Powell was at Carlyle Group from 1997 to 2005, and he served as a senior official of the Treasury Department under President George H.W. Bush. He's been at the Fed since 2012.

The latest Fed changes were reflected in an update of its website that lists board-member assignments. Eric Kollig, a Fed spokesman, declined to comment on the transition.

To contact the reporter on this story: Jesse Hamilton in Washington at jhamilton33@bloomberg.net.

To contact the editor responsible for this story: Jesse Westbrook at jwestbrook1@bloomberg.net, Justin Blum