CFPB Director Richard Cordray last week defended the approach his agency has taken in its public enforcement actions, which many in the industry have criticized as “regulation by enforcement.” “I think that criticism is badly misplaced,” Cordray said Wednesday in a speech at a meeting of the Consumer Bankers Association in Phoenix. Certainly, he said, any responsible official charged with enforcing the law has to recognize that he should be thoughtful in how he deploys his agency’s limited resources most efficiently to protect the public. “That means working toward a pattern of actions that conveys an intelligible direction to the marketplace, so as to create deterrence that can be readily understood and implemented,” said the CFPB chief. The alternative, as ...