Muni Think

Recent congressional hearings and their aftermath have led to increased and evolved discussion of financial reform and the regulation of practitioners in the field of municipal securities. The current focal point, and long-time elephant in the room, is fiduciary duty and how it should or should not apply to various participants in the municipal securities process.

Since its inception in the early 1990s, the tax-exempt swap market has allowed issuers to execute synthetic pay-fixed interest rate swaps to produce interest-cost savings relative to traditional fixed-rate bonds.

Like a snowball rolling down a hill, the idea of applying a fiduciary duty standard to broker-dealers is gaining momentum.

Michael Decker, managing director and co-head of municipal securities at SIFMA, sets forth his case for not federally regulating underwriters when they provide what he calls “advice” to municipal securities issuers.

Like a snowball rolling down a hill, the idea of applying a fiduciary duty standard to broker-dealers is gaining momentum.

A troubling series of proposals has emerged in the U.S. Senate debate over changes to federal regulation of the financial markets.

Congress must extend the expansion of the bank-qualified provision and the 2% de minimis rule to help issuers raise money at reasonable costs.

Things get stranger and stranger. Consequences are serious. Two key areas are MSRB Rule G-23 and the legislation approved by the Senate Banking Committee that includes plans for regulating financial advisers. Make no mistake — issuer protections are at stake.

President Obama and Congress need to appoint U.S. Sen. George Voinovich to chair a bipartisan, intergovernmental commission to assess and make recommendations on the credit crisis confronting the nation’s state and local governments.

Few, if any, municipal finance professionals were predicting at the beginning of last year that 2009 would be one of the strongest years ever for municipal debt issuance.