The blunt assessment of Dodd-Frank Act swaps market rulemaking thus far by Scott O’Malia, a commissioner on the Commodity Futures Trading Commission: an overly complicated, excessively expensive compliance burden . O’Malia laid out his criticisms during a speech at the Annual Nuclear Industry Conference in Charlotte, NC, on May 22. The Dodd-Frank Act requires all […]
Joe Mont
Posted inFrom the Archive
Proxy Advisers Urge Walmart Ousters
Walmart’s annual shareholders meeting next week is shaping up to be a battleground. Thus far, ahead on the June 1 meeting, three proxy advisory firms have urged shareholders to vote against CEO Michael Duke amid investigations into the use of bribes in Mexico. On May 19, Institutional Shareholder Services (ISS) recommended that its approximately 1,700 […]
Posted inInternal Controls
Electronic Information Deluge Putting a Strain on Records Management
Despite increased resources and good intentions, companies are still fumbling when it comes to executing a comprehensive information management program that balances the unique needs of physical and electronic documents. That’s the overarching conclusion of the latest Iron Mountain Compliance Benchmark Report, an analysis developed from more than 4,000 compliance risk assessments with input from […]
Posted inRisk Management
JPMorgan Loss Illustrates Difficulties of Adopting the Volcker Rule
When Troy Paredes, a commissioner on the Securities and Exchange Commission, addressed the audience at the “SEC Speaks” event in Washington D.C. earlier this year, he provided some insight into the difficulties of crafting the banking industry regulations against proprietary trading known as the Volcker Rule. “The notice of proposed rulemaking is lengthy, dense, and […]
Posted inFrom the Archive
SEC and FINRA Drawn Into Facebook Fiasco
As fallout from Friday’s glitch-laden Facebook public launch intensifies, NASDAQ has announced that it will work with the Securities Exchange Commission and the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority on a plan that could include financial restitution for unfilled orders. “As a result of a technical error occurring during the Facebook IPO electronic opening cross process, some […]
Posted inFrom the Archive
CFTC Could Amend Aggregation Requirements
On Friday, the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) announced proposed rules that would ease requirements put in place last year as part of an effort to rein in commodity market speculation. The proposal would ease aggregation provisions for limits on speculative positions. Currently traders are required to combine positions of companies in which they own […]
Posted inFrom the Archive
Oxfam America Sues SEC Over Missed Dodd-Frank Deadline
Oxfam America is suing the Securities and Exchange Commission over its failure to implement a provision of the Dodd-Frank Act requiring the disclosure of payments from oil, gas, and mining companies to foreign governments. The lawsuit, filed Thursday in the US District Court for the District of Massachusetts, asks the court to order the SEC […]
Posted inFrom the Archive
PFAC Pushes Changes to Proxy Distribution Fees
The Proxy Fee Advisory Committee (PFAC), formed by the New York Stock Exchange, has released recommendations for changing the fees paid by public companies to banks and brokers for the distribution of proxy materials to shareholders who hold their stock in “street name.” The recommendations propose to streamline proxy fees and make them more transparent […]
Posted inFrom the Archive
Hearing Will Examine Regulator Settlements
The Financial Services Committee of the U.S. House of Representatives will hold a hearing on Thursday, May 17, to examine the settlement practices of federal financial regulators. “Federal regulators often settle enforcement actions against defendants too quickly impose and collect fines or institute corrective actions rather than litigate lengthy and expensive trials whose outcomes are […]
Posted inFrom the Archive
Big Banks Issued New Stress Test Guidance
On May 14 , the Federal Reserve Board, Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, and the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation jointly issued guidance for stress testing by banking institutions with more than $10 billion in assets. The guidelines issued by these banking regulators do not implement stress testing requirements in either the Dodd-Frank Act […]
