Law and regulation

An attorney in California contends that the state treasurer erred by not allowing public comment prior to rolling out an anti-pay-to-play initiative.

Gates Capital Corp. agreed to pay a $22,500 fine after the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority found the firm violated transaction reporting standards mandated under Municipal Securities Rulemaking Board rules.

One former Kildare Capital employee has been banned from the market and another was hit with a $25,000 fine and 12-month ban after FINRA found that they artificially inflated interdealer prices for municipal securities through 25 round-trip transactions.

While dealer groups are pushing the Municipal Securities Rulemaking Board to place more restrictions on its proposal to share trade data with academics, researchers say the ones the MSRB has already floated threaten to render the data hard to use or even useless.

California Treasurer John Chiang's efforts to combat pay-to-play activities among local issuers received mixed reviews from municipal bond industry participants.

The Upper Mohawk Valley Regional Water Finance Authority received a green bond assessment of GB1 for $8.78 million of water system revenue bonds on Wednesday from Moody's Investors Service -- the first GBA the rating agency has issued in the U.S.

Five municipal market groups are asking the Securities and Exchange Commission for guidance that would help create a streamlined process for issuers to amend their continuing disclosure agreements without running afoul of Rule 15c2-12 on disclosure.

Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump on Monday described an economic plan that he said would create “the biggest tax revolution since the Reagan tax reform” and “cut regulations massively.”

A federal judge on Friday dismissed Securities and Exchange Commission charges against Peter Cannava, a banker involved in an ill-fated private placement for startup video game company 38 Studios.

The Securities and Exchange Commission is arguing that any court challenge to the constitutionality of revised Rule G-37 on political contributions can be made when an enforcement action is taken over a violation of the rule.

The Municipal Securities Rulemaking Board filed an amendment with the Securities and Exchange Commission on Thursday to make clear that although its revised rule against pay-to-play practices does not take effect until Aug. 17, there is still a two-year lookback under the current rule for individuals who make contributions before that date and then become associated with dealers.

Underhanded pay-to-play practices may come back in play.

The par amount of municipal trades reached the highest level in nearly three years during the second quarter of 2016, showing a rebound from significant declines in the second half of last year, according to Municipal Securities Rulemaking Board statistics posted Wednesday.

Colleen Woodell, former chief credit officer of global and corporate government ratings with S&P Global Ratings, will become the Municipal Securities Rulemaking Board’s new chair on Oct. 1.

The Municipal Securities Rulemaking Board plans to rebate $5.5 million proportionally among dealers, file a proposal with the Securities and Exchange Commission on markup disclosure, and scrap the idea of requiring municipal advisors to disclose information about their issuer client's bank loans or privately placed municipal securities.

Goldman Sachs & Co. has agreed to pay $50,000 to settle Financial Industry Regulatory Authority charges that it submitted inaccurate auction rate securities information to a reporting system and did not have a supervisory system in place to catch the problems.

The Securities and Exchange Commission was legally required by fiscal 2016 appropriation act provisions to reject changes to Rule G-37 that extended political contribution restrictions to municipal advisors, three state Republican groups told federal appeals court judges.

Not enough has been done to provide municipal issuers, obligated parties and underwriters the clarity sought and needed by the market.

The Securities and Exchange Commission is arguing it can't fight a lawsuit challenging a revised rule to curb municipal securities pay-to-play activity because the fiscal 2016 appropriations act prohibits it from spending money on any rules governing political contributions.

California Treasurer John Chiang announced that municipal finance firms seeking state business will be required to certify that they will make no contributions to local bond election campaigns in the state.