An eleventh hour rule from the Office of the Comptroller of Currency prevents banks from refusing to deal with specific industries such as firearms or oil, a move that puts a serious dent in efforts to use financial pressure to trigger social change, reported Bloomberg.

The regulation cuts off pledges such as the one made by Bank of America in 2018, which announced that it would not extend credit to makers of military style firearms, or the more recent declaration by five of the six largest banks that they would not fund Arctic oil drilling. Banks can still deny services, but the decision must be based on quantitative and objective measures rather than what industry the applicant is from, said the Wall Street Journal, which added that the rule was created due to complaints from the fossil fuel industry.

While generally not considered natural allies, both bankers and environmentalists are outraged by the new rule, said CNN—banks because it's a restriction on how run their own businesses, and environmentalists because of fears it could disrupt financial pressure campaigns. But the rule's staying power is uncertain, as it is almost certain to draw litigation from some very deep-pocketed plaintiffs, if the incoming Biden administration doesn't just get rid of it entirely.

The regulation calls to mind a similar one approved by the Department of Labor last year that curtailed the degree to which retirement plans can consider environmental, social and governance (ESG) factors when making investments. Formally approved in October, the rules, essentially, say that Employee Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA) plan fiduciaries may not invest in ESG vehicles when they understand that an underlying investment strategy of the vehicle is to subordinate return or increase risk for the purpose of nonfinancial objectives, and so they cannot subordinate the interests of plan participants and beneficiaries in retirement income and financial benefits to "non-pecuniary" goals.