The new bill represents a major legislative victory for Obama just before election-year politics overtakes the rest of his ambitious agenda.
 

The law assembles a powerful council of regulators to be on the lookout for risks across the finance system and creates a new agency to guard consumers in their financial transactions. It places financial markets that previously escaped the oversight of regulators under new scrutiny and gives the government new powers to break up companies that threaten the economy.
 

Large, failing financial institutions would be liquidated and the costs assessed on their surviving peers. Borrowers will be protected from hidden fees and abusive terms, but also will have to provide evidence that they can repay their loans. The Federal Reserve will get new powers while at the same time coming under expanded congressional oversight.
 

Officials note however that  many of the law's provisions won't take effect for at least a year as regulators scramble to write new rules and implement them.
 

"That will take some time, but it is worth it," Deputy Treasury Secretary Neal Wolin said Tuesday.
 

While the bill represents the end of a year's work by Congress and the administration, Obama has yet to nominate a director to the independent consumer protection bureau, an agency that became one of the bill's flashpoints and was attacked by Republicans as a broad expansion of government power over private business.

The White House was planning a major signing ceremony featuring a long list of supporters of the legislation, including former Federal Reserve Chairman Paul Volcker and Robert Diamond, president of Barclay's PLC.

(AP contributed to this report)