WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump is exploring whether to break up some of the largest U.S. banks by resurrecting a Great Depression law that kept consumer and investment banks separate.
Trump told Bloomberg News in an Oval Office interview: “I’m looking at that right now.”
The president added, “There’s some people that want to go back to the old system, right? So we’re going to look at that.”
Trump has been outspoken critic of financial regulations approved after the 2008 financial crisis, saying they have stifled economic growth.
But over the course of his presidential campaign, he encouraged restoring a version of the 1933 Glass-Steagall law that kept banks from offering both consumer lending and investment banking services. The law was repealed as part of the 1999 financial deregulation under then-President Bill Clinton.