The Senate approved a sweeping set of financial overhauls Thursday, delivering a major victory to President Obama two years after the mortgage meltdown and a worldwide credit crisis staggered the economy.

The 60-39 vote ends a year of bitter partisan battling between Democrats and Republicans over which party was more committed to ending future corporate bailouts and was standing up for average Americans against the powerful interests of Wall Street.

Only three Republicans - Scott Brown of Massachusetts and Susan Collins and Olympia Snowe, both of Maine - voted for the bill, which was strongly backed by the White House and Democratic congressional leaders.

Supporters of the overhaul, the most far-reaching clampdown on the industry since the Great Depression, said the legislation will help prevent another financial crisis. Opponents said it was a dangerous expansion of government involvement in the financial system.

The House passed the 2,300-page bill by a 237-192 vote last month, and Obama is expected to quickly sign it into law.

Only a simple majority was needed to pass the overhaul.

"We're saying to those who gamed the system: The game is over," said Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., slamming Wall Street companies for taking huge risks that brought the financial system to the brink of collapse.

The bill creates a bureau within the Federal Reserve to protect consumers in the financial marketplace, establishes a council of regulators to monitor the financial system for major risks, imposes tough regulations on complex financial derivatives, grants shareholders a nonbinding vote on executive compensation and gives the government authority to seize and dismantle teetering firms whose failure would pose a danger to the economy.

To help pay for the $19 billion cost of the expanded regulation over the next 10 years, the legislation immediately ends any additional expenditures from the controversial $700 billion Troubled Asset Relief Program bailout fund, or TARP. The fund was to expire in October.