Far West

WASHINGTON — The Treasury Department released interim guidance yesterday instructing municipal issuers how to issue four tax-credit bonds as direct-subsidy bonds, as was authorized by a jobs law enacted in March.

WASHINGTON — All 41 Senate Republicans and one Democrat voted Monday evening against limiting debate on a massive financial regulatory reform bill, depriving Democrats leadership of the 60 votes they needed to move forward with a vote the full Senate.

Four major municipal market groups yesterday urged the Treasury Department to immediately issue interim guidance on how to determine issue price for Build America Bonds, warning that confusion surrounding the topic is having a “chilling effect” on the still-developing market.

The Investment Company Institute is urging the Municipal Securities Rulemaking Board to expand the proposed second phase of its transparency system for short-term debt to include more types of data and documents, while the Securities Industry and Financial Markets Association is concerned that the expansion would be unduly onerous for dealers.

New-issue prices for Build America Bonds remain a hot topic among municipal market participants, as several market groups last week were weighing asking the Treasury Department for clarification on the subject.

This chart includes legislation introduced in the 111th Congress, which convened in January and extends through the end of 2010.

SAN FRANCISCO — The Los Angeles County Metropolitan Transportation Authority unanimously voted to endorse Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa’s proposal to accelerate the region’s mass-transit capital plan.

WASHINGTON — The Financial Industry Regulatory Authority announced yesterday that it has fined HSBC Securities Inc. $1.5 million and U.S. Bancorp Investments Inc. $275,000 to settle sales-practice violations for municipal and other auction-rate securities the firms sold to retail customers.

WASHINGTON — When President Obama last spoke at New York’s Cooper Union as a presidential candidate two years ago, he called for an overhaul of the “balkanized” regulatory system for the financial markets and blamed the credit crisis on Washington lobbyists and politicians who engineered deregulation in the late 1990s.

SAN FRANCISCO — California’s big underwriters make markets in credit default swaps on the biggest municipal issuer’s general obligation bonds, but they don’t seem to be betting against the state.