A dispute over how much power to give a new financial consumer watchdog will be the first issue dealt with by lawmakers when they enter the home stretch on Wall Street reforms, Reuters reported.

A joint Senate-House of Representatives panel will meet Tuesday with the intention of completing final legislation by Thursday. Meeting that goal may be hard with unresolved issues piling up and the most controversial proposals facing the panel yet to come, Reuters said.

“If anyone can force his colleagues over the finish line, it’s Chairman (Barney) Frank and his firecracker gavel,” said Karen Shaw Petrou, managing partner at Federal Financial Analytics, a firm that advises on regulatory policy.

The congressional conference committee led by Frank is crafting a sweeping package of reforms that will combine bills already approved by the two chambers. The finished product will have to win approval once more. Then it can go to President Barack Obama to sign. Democrats hope for that to occur by July 4.

The bill will be the biggest overhaul of financial regulation since the 1930s. Enactment would give Obama and the Democrats a major policy victory to add to health-care reform going into November’s general elections.

“I expect a couple of long sessions,” said Brian Gardner, a policy analyst at investment firm Keefe, Bruyette & Woods Inc. “They’ll try to move heaven and earth to finish by the end of the week. But … it might be tough.”