Office of the Under Secretary for Domestic Finance; Financial Subsidiaries — 2001-02-02 [01-2732]

Section 121 of the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act (GLBA) permits a national bank or state member bank that is among the second 50 largest insured banks to own or control a financial subsidiary only if the bank meets either the eligible debt requirement set forth in section 121 of the Act or alternative criteria established jointly by the Board and Treasury. On March 14, 2000, the Board and Treasury adopted and requested public comment on an interim rule establishing this alternative criteria. The interim rule provided that a national or state member bank meets the alternative criteria if the bank has a current long-term issuer credit rating from a nationally recognized statistical rating organization that is within the three highest investment grade rating categories used by the organization.