In years past, the Securities and Exchange Commission used a light touch on its enforcement efforts in municipal securities and pension funds. Not any more.
This year the agency dedicated itself, in a very public way, to identifying fraud in the nearly $3 trillion municipal bond market and to cracking down on pay-to-play schemes that continue to permeate the pension fund arena. As developments in October demonstrate, the SEC is beginning to see the fruits of its labor, and much more enforcement activity may be on the way.
The increased scrutiny shouldn’t come as a surprise ...