Photo of Ethan G. Ostroff

Ethan’s practice focuses on financial services litigation and compliance counseling, as well as digital assets and blockchain technology. With a long track record of successful litigation results across the U.S., both bank and non-bank clients rely on him for comprehensive advice throughout their business cycle.

The Supreme Court agreed to hear a consumer’s appeal from the Third Circuit’s ruling that his claims under the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act were time-barred despite being brought within one year of discovering the violation.  The circuits have been split on whether the one-year statute of limitations under the FDCPA begins to run when

On February 22, 2019, the Third Circuit Court of Appeals issued a precedential ruling affirming a district court’s finding that Crown Asset Management LLC is a debt collector under the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act. In doing so, the Third Circuit interpreted the Supreme Court’s recent ruling in Henson v. Santander, Consumer USA Inc., 137

On February 13, the Federal Trade Commission issued its annual report for fiscal year 2018 and announced that enforcement actions from July 2017 through June 2018 yielded more than $2.3 billion in refunds to allegedly defrauded U.S. consumers.  To put the total sum in perspective, the $2.3 billion figure was almost eight times the FTC’s

On February 20, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau released a compliance guide for small entities that summarizes payment-related provisions of the Payday Lending Rule.

The Payday Lending Rule governs payday loans, vehicle tile loans, and certain high-cost installment loans.  The Guide focuses on the payment provisions of the Payday Lending rule, found in Subpart C

The Telephone Consumer Protection Act (“TCPA”) carries the risk of annihilative damages for class action defendants based on its remarkable statutory damages scheme. Because of this risk, the statute has been the subject of significant court and agency attention recently. And much of this attention – from the D.C. Circuit’s opinion in ACA International to

The United States District Court for the Western District of Texas recently granted summary judgment in favor of a debt collector, holding that letters sent with the same client account number for two different debts incurred with the same underlying creditor was not false, deceptive, or misleading or otherwise in violation of the Fair Debt 

In a recent ruling, the Second Circuit Court of Appeals affirmed the district court’s $10 million disgorgement order assessed jointly and severally not only against collection agencies but also their individual owners.  The Second Circuit’s decision can be found here.

This case involved thirteen debt collection companies that operated pursuant to the same strategy:

The House of Representatives’ Financial Services Committee convened for a hearing last week entitled “Challenges and Solutions: Access to Banking Services for Cannabis-Related Businesses.”  At the hearing, the Committee focused on a “discussion draft” of the Secure and Fair Enforcement Banking Act of 2019 (the “SAFE Banking Act),

On February 7, 2019, AllianceOne Receivables Management, Inc. (“AllianceOne”), a debt collector, agreed to pay $2.2 million to settle a nationwide class action alleging violations of the Fair Credit Reporting Act (“FCRA”) for obtaining consumer reports on individuals with outstanding parking tickets without a permissible purpose.

The parties moved to approve the settlement after more

The Texas House of Representatives recently introduced new legislation, H.B. No. 996, to amend the Texas Fair Consumer Debt Collection Act (“TFCDCA”) to require debt buyers to provide additional written disclosures to consumers regarding debt that could be subject to a statute of limitations defense in a collection action. 

The proposed bill comes as