Far West

Arbitration panels for the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority have ordered Citigroup to pay roughly $2.2 million to investors who lost money in one of the bank’s municipal bond arbitrage vehicles.

ALAMEDA, Calif. — A California Senate committee has approved a watered-down version of a bill designed to make it harder for cities or other local agencies to file for Chapter 9 municipal bankruptcy.

WASHINGTON — The House on Friday voted 215 to 204 to approve legislation that would extend the Build America Bond program for two years, while gradually reducing the subsidy payments the federal government makes to BAB issuers.

WASHINGTON — The House was poised late Thursday to consider an amendment to the tax-extenders package that would slightly alter the distribution of nearly $1 billion to states for transportation projects.

LOS ANGELES — The first public-private partnership project under a program championed by California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger recently cleared a major procedural hurdle, though questions remain over whether the Presidio Parkway project is the right way to use P3s.

WASHINGTON — The Internal Revenue Service plans to ask issuers of negotiated Build America Bond transactions, in a revised “compliance-check questionnaire,” if any investors who bought their bonds in the primary market paid more than the price the bonds were initially offered at.

WASHINGTON — The Securities and Exchange Commission Wednesday unanimously approved amendments to its Rule 15c2-12 on disclosure that, like the ones proposed in July, will increase the quantity and timeliness of municipal issuers’ continuing disclosures.

WASHINGTON — The Internal Revenue Service plans to audit one of every two Build America Bond transactions, Steve Chamberlin, a senior manager in the IRS’ tax-exempt bond office, said during a teleconference Tuesday sponsored by the National Association of Bond Lawyers.

WASHINGTON — The Internal Revenue Service, concerned that some Build America Bonds are being sold to investors at prices that are too high, is urging municipal issuers to track the trading of their BABs through the Electronic Municipal Market Access system and to question underwriters about the pricing.

WASHINGTON — As the two chambers of Congress begin to hammer out a single financial regulatory reform bill over the next several weeks, industry groups have mixed views about a provision in the Senate bill that would prohibit banks from engaging in proprietary trading but exclude municipal, Treasury and federal agency securities from the ban.