Sifma : News on the capital markets, securities and financial industry

Washington Roundup

House challenges CFTC's rule-making on derivatives trading
Rather than going after the overhaul of financial regulations as a whole, House Republicans are taking a different approach. Their latest move is a legislative effort focused on rule-making by the Commodity Futures Trading Commission. Read the SIFMA news release. Politico (Washington, D.C.)(11/30)

Central banks try to ease funding woes as crisis continues
The Federal Reserve led several central banks in cutting dollar-borrowing costs for banks as officials try to resolve Europe's sovereign-debt crisis. The moves caused a rally in stocks and commodities. The European Central Bank and central banks in the U.K., Switzerland, Japan and Canada also participated. The central banks said they would establish a bilateral swap program to ease funding challenges using any of their currencies. Bloomberg(11/30), Reuters(12/1), BBC(11/30), The New York Times (tiered subscription model)(11/30), The Telegraph (London)(11/30), The Guardian (London)(11/30)

MSRB offers broker-dealers guidance for muni sales
The Municipal Securities Rulemaking Board said that when broker-dealers sell municipal securities in the secondary market, they are not required to make online searches first. SIFMA welcomed the MSRB's guidance. "We appreciate that the needle appears to have moved here, and the regulators clearly have taken some of our comments into consideration," said Leslie Norwood, managing director and co-head of the municipal securities division at SIFMA. Read the SIFMA letter. The Bond Buyer (special access for readers of SIFMA SmartBrief)(12/1)

OCC proposes rule to strip credit-rating references
The Office of the Comptroller of the Currency proposed a rule that would replace credit ratings with alternative measures of creditworthiness in securities offerings and investment securities. "National banks and federal savings associations would be expected to continue to maintain appropriate ongoing reviews of their investment portfolios," the office said. Bloomberg Businessweek(11/30)

• Other News

Fed appoints Gibson as director of regulatory division
The Wall Street Journal (12/1)

Operations Update

Progress continues on legal-entity identifiers
The Financial Stability Board is working on a governance framework for legal-entity identifiers, which have gained momentum and support in the past few months. "We have achieved a tremendous amount globally to get buy-in. We have the [Group of 20] finance ministers and leaders endorsing the LEI, so from a top-down perspective, it is all going well," said David Strongin, SIFMA's managing director. "But I think our challenge now is to ensure that, as countries start to implement this, they do it in a way that is going to meet the needs of each local marketplace, but also the unique LEI ... that we have set up globally." Learn more about LEI. WatersTechnology.com(11/30)