Reince Priebus, President Trump's chief of staff, has issued a memorandum to all US federal agencies that forbids them fron bringing any new regulations into effect. Some news reports are saying that this has been done before, but not by an administration so resolute for de-regulation.

The mechanism by which this happens is an order to every agency to desist from placing regulations that are 'in the pipeline' onto the Federal Register (America's government gazette, on a par with the London and Edinburgh Gazette) unless and until presidential representatives - presumably including Priebus himself - approve of them. The review period is said to involve a 60-day postponement of effective dates. Radio Free Europe has reported that "the memo is similar to one that Obama's chief of staff issued the day Obama was inaugurated in 2009."

A little-known law enacted in 1996, which the Trump team wishes to use, allows Congress to repeal recently enacted rules by "simple majority votes," whatever that might mean.

On the HNW front

As regards HNW individuals and their wealth, the memo suspends a proposal for a rule to change the terms of EB-5 visas for wealthy immigrants who promise to invest in job-creating projects in America. The EB-5 Immigrant Investor Visa provides permanent residency to foreigners and their immediate families if they invest in US businesses or real estate opportunities that result in the creation of new jobs. The US Immigration & Naturalisation Services (now renamed) created it in 1990. It is limited to 10,000 visas per annum. There is a required equity investment of $1 million (reduced to $500,000 if the investment is made in a "targeted employment area" or TEA). The now-suspended proposal is for the standard investment threshold to rise to $1.8 million (or to $1.35 million in a TEA). A few Republican bigwigs have, however, voiced their approval for this to become a rule, so its future might go either way.

The advantages of the visa scheme (or 'programme,' as the Americans call it) are permanent residence; green cards for the husband, wife and all unmarried children under 21; permission for them to live anywhere in the United States; the acceptance of funds (in the form of gifts, loans, executive severance payments, Self-Invested Personal Pensions or SIPPs, trusts and divorce settlements) from any any legal foreign or US source; the right to do nothing and retire; an absence of scruple about the investor's nationality, which presumably includes North Korean, Iranian, Syrian and Russian; no language requirement; no business training required; the same privileges as a US citizen; free education in America's universally envied public schools; the same university fees as a US citizen; access to Social Security benefits; property tax savings in some states; the entitlement to sponsor one's own relatives for an immigration 'green card'; and US citizenship after five years, which conincidentally is the same time that one has to wait before being allowed to relinquish US citizenship.

Financial regulations

Priebus mentions no financial regulations in his memo by name. However, subject to any exceptions that he might allow for emergency situations or other urgent circumstances relating to health, safety, financial, or national security matters, he urges the departments to send no regulations to the Federal Register until Trump appointees approve them. It is hard to think of any "urgent circumstances" that might exempt financial regulations from the moratorium.

Some paragraphs later, the White House chief of staff exhorts the agencies to tell him promptly of any regulations that, in their view, should be excluded from the moratorium because they affect "critical health, safety, financial, or national security matters." He will then review them himself. Again, the stipulation that exemptions have to be 'critical' seems to exclude all but the most pressing, and financial regulations never are.

Existing laws

No existing laws are being placed 'on hold,' as the President lacks the power to order such a thing. However, one piece of existing legislation is scheduled for demolition under the new regime. In an interview with Reuters on 17th May last year, Trump talked of being "close to dismantling Dodd-Frank...Dodd-Frank is a very negative force, which has developed a very bad name."