John Walsh, the acting comptroller of the currency, who had raised concerns about the standard being too broad, said he was pleased with the changes.

“I was concerned that it seemed to focus more on job titles than the actual actions that people had taken,” he said.

The liquidation authority is a major part of the Dodd-Frank law. The idea is to preserve economic stability by unwinding troubled firms, but in a way that is less politically explosive than taxpayer-financed bailouts and less traumatic to the markets than bankruptcies like the Lehman Brothers collapse of 2008.

At the top of the list of what will be paid off first under the new resolution system are any debts the F.D.I.C. or receiver took on as part of the cost of seizing a firm, administrative expenses, money owed to the Treasury and money owed to employees for things like retirement benefits.