The Filing Cabinet

The newly released Unified Agenda of Federal Regulatory and Deregulatory Actions illustrates the torrid pace of rule-slashing engaged in by the Trump Administration. Another takeaway: don't expect lingering Dodd-Frank rulemaking to reappear any time soon.

The SEC will meet next week to take the next step in an ongoing review of its disclosure regime. On March 30, the Commission, in an open meeting, will consider whether to issue a concept release seeking comment on modernizing business and financial disclosure requirements in Regulation S-K. Also at the meeting, the Commission will consider whether to adopt rules regarding the business conduct standards for security-based swap dealers and major security-based swap participants.

The Federal Reserve Board has clarified its procedures for emergency lending to banking institutions and placed new restrictions on future bailouts. A final rule, approved Monday and effective on Jan. 1, broadens the existing definition of insolvency and requires that emergency lending be approved by the Treasury Department. These and other lending limitations included in the rule were required by the Dodd-Frank Act. Details inside.

There was a warning last week from Fed Governor Daniel Tarullo to expect an increase to stress test minimum capital requirements and a proposed rule requiring banks to publicly disclose aspects of their liquidity profile. Also announced was an effort to improve the consistency of supervisory examinations and a one-year deadline extension for certain capital requirements. Details inside.

A recent poll by Towers Watson hints at big changes to come in disclosure of executive compensation, in the wake of the SEC’s proposed pay-for-performance rules. One-third of poll respondents said they expect to change their compensation disclosure significantly; 55 percent said they expect to provide additional information and analysis that go beyond what the proposed rules will require. Details inside.

The latest push to get the SEC to act on a rulemaking petition that companies disclose political contributions and spending on lobbyists: pressure from former commissioners. “The Commission’s inaction is inexplicable,” William Henry Donaldson, Arthur Levitt, and Bevis Longstreth wrote in a letter to current SEC Chair Mary Jo White. “Its failure to act offends not only us ... it flies in the face of the primary mission of the Commission.” More inside.

The SEC has proposed new rules and forms to modernize reporting for mutual funds, ETFs, and other registered investment companies. A new monthly portfolio reporting requirement, Form N-PORT, would require registered funds, other than money market funds, to provide portfolio-wide and position-level holdings data to the SEC. Details inside.

The SEC has approved a proposal by the national securities exchanges and the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority for a two-year pilot program that will widen the minimum quoting and trading increments, known as tick sizes, for stocks of some smaller companies. The program—to begin May 6, 2016—will include stocks of companies with $3 billion or less in market capitalization. Details inside.

The Conflict-Free Sourcing Initiative has published an update to its Conflict Minerals Reporting Template, a tool for tracing the use of conflict minerals in a company’s supply chain and validating smelters. CMRT 4.0, a free reporting template, expedites the identification of new smelters and refiners that may undergo an audit through CFSI’s Conflict-Free Smelter Program. See inside for more details.

The SEC has proposed a new pay-for-performance disclosure rule, requiring companies to report the relationship between compensation paid to named executive officers and the Total Shareholder Return of both the company and its peer group. The proposal marks the first time the Commission will require data tagging in the XBRL format beyond financial statements. More inside.

A bill filed by Sens. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) and James Lankford (R-Okla.) would require transparency on tax deductions that minimize the cost of an enforcement action. Any statement by a federal agency about the value of a settlement would need to explain how much of that agreement is tax deductible or offset by credits for particular conduct. Companies would also need to disclose settlement reductions in SEC filings.

The SEC will hold an open meeting April 29 to take action on pay-for-performance disclosure rules required by the Dodd-Frank Act. The Commission will consider rules stemming from Section 953 of Dodd-Frank, requiring public companies to disclose the relationship between executive pay and incentives with the financial performance of the company. Details inside.

SEC Commissioners Daniel Gallagher and Michael Piwowar fired off a testy complaint Wednesday about “a significant failure” of the SEC’s rulemaking process, complaining that SEC staff missed “an extensive comment letter” opposing a recently adopted rule on swaps trading. The oversight should force a reopening of the comment period, they said. More inside.

Rohwer

The latest version of the Conflict Free Sourcing Initiative’s Conflict Minerals Reporting Template is now available. The report provides information on which countries smelters and refiners get their minerals from. The latest version of the report provides improved translations and a more accurate approach to smelter identification. “By gathering the same types of information from many levels of the supply chain in a standardized form, companies can make informed choices about conflict minerals in their supply chains,” Michael Rohwer, CFSI’s program director, said. More inside.