Raj Date, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau’s (CFPB) No. 2, will leave the agency after it finalizes a package of mortgage rules it is currently writing, a spokeswoman said late Monday.
Date, a former strategy consultant and bank executive, was an early member of the CFPB’s implementation team and has held several key leadership positions with the agency, including as its acting director after the departure of founder Elizabeth Warren.
The announcement may put to bed speculation that Date, CFPB’s second-in-command, might someday replace director Richard Cordray. Date did not disclose what he’s going to do after he leaves the bureau, nor has a successor been named.
He said he will depart after CFPB finishes a number of mortgage rules, including the qualified mortgage (QM) rule, which the agency is required to implement as part of the Dodd-Frank reform law.
A definitive
"Deputy director Raj Date is leaving the consumer bureau he helped to establish on Jan. 31, after the CFPB finalizes the slate of mortgage rules Congress mandated,” the spokeswoman said. “Raj has spent more than two years building the agency at a breakneck pace, playing a number of key leadership roles.”
Date’s departure was first reported by Bloomberg News.
Date is a key official at the fledgling agency, and one the industry knew well. He was an executive at Capital One and Deutsche Bank before leaving in 2009 to found the Cambridge Winter Center, a think tank devoted to financial issues.
He was recruited early as a senior advisor to Warren after the CFPB was created by the Dodd-Frank law in July, 2010. He later served as its head of research, markets and regulation before taking over for Warren in January 2011.
He served as acting director of the agency for a year, when Cordray was recess appointed by President Obama. At that point, Date was named as deputy director.
