OVERNIGHT FINANCE: Crucial week for Ex-Im; House trade vote in June?

TOMORROW STARTS TONIGHT: CONGRESS PREPS FOR EX-IM HEARINGS. Ready for the wonk war. With the clock ticking down until the 80-year-old bank’s charter expires on June 30, the Senate Banking Committee and the House Financial Services Committee are set to hold hearings this week that could very well determine its fate. Here’s what you need to know:

1.) The bank’s charter will likely at least temporarily expire. Sources working to reauthorize and end the bank now both acknowledge that it’s unlikely the House will vote to reauthorize the bank this month. House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) left it off the schedule. There very well could be a Senate vote on the issue, but it’d go nowhere in the House. The fight is far from over, though…

{mosads}2.) A more likely Ex-Im legislative vehicle is still viable in July. A post-June 30 reauthorization would allow for critics including House Financial Services Committee Chairman Jeb Hensarling (R-Texas) to claim at least a mini-political victory should the bank temporarily lose its charter.

— Hearing prep: Tomorrow’s Senate Banking Committee hearing is just a warm-up to Wednesday and Thursday’s hearings where Ex-Im president Fred Hochberg will testify. But Linda Dempsey, a top supporter of the Bank from the National Association of Manufacturers (NAM), will testify: “Ex-Im is critical. Of the Bank’s 3,300 small business transactions in FY 2014, 545 companies were first-time Ex-Im users. Small businesses are direct Ex-Im users and many supply to larger U.S. exporters. If Exim is closed, small business exporters would feel it first.” 

3.) Republicans are increasingly looking to connect Ex-Im with Hillary Clinton. Most people outside of Washington are not keyed into the Ex-Im fight. But certain conservatives are banking that they’ll be able to turn it into another “Bridge to Nowhere.” Earlier today, Freedom Partners blasted out opposition linking to a 2010 hearing where Clinton testified as Secretary of State before Congress saying she wanted to put “Ex-Im on steroids.” http://bit.ly/1cuQChR

— LEGISLATIVE DAYS UNTIL EX-IM’s CHARTER ENDS: 16.

THIS IS OVERNIGHT FINANCE. I hope you each have a great week. Tweet: @kevcirilli; email: kcirilli@digital-release.thehill.com; and subscribe: http://digital-release.thehill.com/signup/48. Back to work…

MCCARTHY: TRADE VOTE THIS MONTH, via Scott Wong: “House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) said Monday he plans to get to a vote by the end of June on giving President Obama broad authority to negotiate trade deals.” http://bit.ly/1AJK4r1

METEOROLOGISTS KNOW MORE THAN ECONOMISTS, via David Harrison for WSJ: “Fed-watchers and economists have spent the past few weeks trying to figure out how bad weather in the first quarter affected growth. Now a new paper published by the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas suggests we should take a much broader, worldwide look at what climate — specifically the El Niño pattern — does to economies. The researchers even suggest that policy makers should consider global weather patterns in deciding what to do with interest rates.” http://on.wsj.com/1EQ3eqp

FISCHER: THE ECONOMY IS FINE. “I don’t, at present, see a major financial crisis on the horizon,” Federal Reserve Vice Chairman Stanley Fischer said Monday, answering audience questions after a speech to a bankers’ conference in Toronto. WSJ: http://on.wsj.com/1Fq1mq6

MARIJUANA VOTE-A-RAMA SET FOR WEDNESDAY, via Tim Devaney: “Lawmakers are prepping for what could turn into a ‘marijuana vote-a-rama’ Wednesday, sources say. Pot advocates expect lawmakers to introduce at least half a dozen marijuana-related appropriations amendments that would roll back the Justice Department’s authority to enforce drug laws around the country. The marijuana amendments would handicap the Department of Justice (DOJ) in its fight with states over the enforcement of local pot laws.” STORY: http://bit.ly/1FpLC6h

U.S. PAID BENEFITS TO ALLEGED NAZIS, via Rebecca Shabad: “The Social Security Administration paid $20.2 million in benefits between 1962 and this year to 133 people who were alleged, or found, to have been involved in Nazi persecution, according to a new report.” http://bit.ly/1AJKfmi

ON-TAP FOR THE WEEK: My exclusive preview of the week in financial services in Washington: http://bit.ly/1FpUs42. 

ARE REGULATORS ON CRAIGSLIST? My piece for the hometown paper over the weekend: “Senate Republicans are investigating whether backlogged U.S. employment regulators are using Craigslist ads to pursue cases against businesses that no outside party has brought to their attention.

“Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.) has asked the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) if the agency used the classified advertisements site to solicit complaints, while the agency has 75,000 cases pending.” http://bit.ly/1SRy9gL

FIFA FALLOUT: DOES US HAVE AUTHORITY? DealBook: “Teddy Roosevelt was fond of the West African proverb to “speak softly and carry a big stick; you will go far.” The Justice Department is wielding one of its biggest sticks – the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act, better known as RICO – to go after bribery and kickbacks that has been rife in international soccer for decades.”

— WHAT IS RICO? DealBook explains: “RICO has been a popular tool for prosecutors to attack the mob, corporate fraud and corrupt politicians in the United States. Now, the latest Justice Department case will test whether the law can be applied to misconduct by foreigners that largely takes place outside the United States.”

— DOES LYNCH HAVE GLOBAL POWER? DealBook: “The Justice Department certainly has a challenge on its hands with the latest case. It filed charges — including money laundering and wire fraud –against 14 defendants, most of whom are not United States citizens, over allegations of accepting bribes related to various soccer competitions sponsored by FIFA and its regional confederations. To prove a RICO case, prosecutors must show that those alleged crimes were part of a broader ‘pattern of racketeering activity’ rather than just separate acts committed by different defendants.”

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