Far West

CARLSBAD, Calif. — One day after a blue-ribbon commission created to reform California’s tax code held its final meeting, experts from both sides of the political spectrum declared its proposals all but dead on arrival during a panel at The Bond Buyer’s California Public Finance Conference.

CARLSBAD, Calif. — The municipal bond market is slowly recovering from the financial panic of 2008, but it’s still a long way from healed.

WASHINGTON — Issuers of direct-pay Build America Bonds will be able to receive their subsidy payments from the Treasury Department electronically beginning in 2010, a top Internal Revenue Service official said yesterday.

WASHINGTON — Retail order periods are often gamed so that retail investors do not get many bonds and dealers or institutional investors sometimes “flip” bonds, purchasing them and then immediately reselling them to retail investors at higher prices, market participants told the Municipal Securities Rulemaking Board last week.

Massachusetts Secretary of Transportation Jim Aloisi announced Friday that he will step down from his post by Nov. 1, the same time that a new bonding authority, the Massachusetts Department of Transportation, will begin overseeing most surface transportation systems throughout the state.

SAN FRANCISCO — Despite recent state budget revisions that incorporated weaker revenue forecasts, California general fund revenue was even lower than expected in August, said Controller John Chiang.