John Reich
| John M. Reich | |
|---|---|
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| Former Director Office of Thrift Supervision | |
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In office August 9, 2005 – February 27, 2009 |
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| President | George W. Bush |
| Succeeded by | OTS Chief Counsel John Bowman (acting) |
| Personal details | |
| Political party | Republican |
| Alma mater | Southern Illinois University |
| Profession | Banker |
John M. Reich was sworn in January 15, 2001, as Director of the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) following an appointment by President of the United States Bill Clinton and served on the FDIC Board for eight years. Reich served as Vice Chairman of the Board of the FDIC from November 2002 until he was nominated on June 7, 2005 by President George W. Bush to be Director of the Office of Thrift Supervision (OTS), and the U.S. Senate confirmed his nomination on July 29, 2005. He also served as Acting Chairman of the FDIC from July to August 2001. As Deputy Chairman, 2001–2005, Reich served as the Chair of FDIC's Audit Committee during a time when the General Accounting Office issued reportable conditions regarding information security at the Corporation.
Reich took the oath of Director of OTS on August 9, 2005 and continued in that capacity as well as serving as a member of the FDIC Board of Directors until he resigned on February 12, 2009 and stepped down February 27, 2009.
Under Director Reich, the Office of Thrift Supervision saw the failure or near-failure of at least five major institutions - IndyMac Bank, AIG, Washington Mutual, Downey Financial and Countrywide Financial. These constituted some of the largest financial failures in modern history to that point. OTS later acknowledged that in the case of AIG it failed to take regulatory actions it should appropriately have taken as early as 2004. In the case of IndyMac, after Director Reich and OTS both denied responsibility for the failure, the Office of Inspector General of the United States Treasury found that OTS both inappropriately failed to act and inappropriately and knowingly allowed regulatory misconduct.
On June 17, 2009, President Barack Obama announced his intention to disband the Office of Thrift Supervision as part of a program of regulatory reform, citing "loopholes that have allowed important institutions to cherry-pick among banking rules".
Prior to coming to Washington, D.C., Reich spent 23 years as a community banker in Illinois and Florida, including 10 years as President and CEO of the National Bank of Sarasota, in Sarasota, Florida, which he led as it grew from a two-office, $17 million institution to a $450 million institution with 19 offices.
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