Law and regulation

Securities and Exchange Commission chairman Mary Jo White's public push for bond market transparency initiatives before year's end improves the chances of major changes affecting muni dealers and investors. The road there will not be easy.

The Securities and Exchange Commission has charged a Philadelphia-area private equity firm with violating pay-to-play rules by receiving advisory fees from the city and state pension funds following campaign contributions an associate made to state and local officials. It is the first case brought by the SEC under its pay-to-play rules for investment advisers.

The Louisiana State Bond Commission plans to hire disclosure counsel to assist in determining if the state complied with continuing disclosure requirements as it weighs the SEC's MCDC initiative.

The market for variable rate demand obligations has contracted five of the last six years, the Municipal Securities Rulemaking Board said in a report released Wednesday.

The House Appropriations Committee has unveiled a fiscal year 2015 bill that would fund the Securities and Exchange Commission at $1.4 billion - $50 million above the fiscal year 2014 level and $300 million below President Obama's budget request.

A coalition of state and local groups has written a letter to Securities and Exchange Commission member Daniel Gallagher countering his recent comments about pension obligation disclosure and arguing that any problems in the area are individual and not universal.

The Securities and Exchange Commission's investigation of the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey must determine if investors needed to know about $1.8 billion of controversial spending, securities law experts said. Others said any SEC enforcement action would not be a fix for the authority's problems.

The Securities Industry and Financial Markets Association has sent a letter to numerous federal regulators arguing that the joint venture structure used for the first time last week to sell tender option bonds should be legal under the Volcker rule.

Merrill Lynch, Pierce, Fenner & Smith Thursday sold the first tender option bonds structured to comply with the Volcker Rule, a feat Moody's Investors Service said will benefit the market by allowing TOB trusts to continue purchasing munis.

The Bond Dealers of America is urging the Securities and Exchange Commission to limit the scope of its continuing disclosure violation self-reporting program and the participation deadline by more than three months.

Fenn Putman, former chair of the Public Securities Association and vice chair of the Municipal Securities Rulemaking Board, passed away on Sunday, June 8, at age 80.

The municipal securities market is "fertile ground" for further enforcement initiatives aimed at getting market participants to comply with their obligations under the law, the Securities and Exchange Commission's enforcement director said Wednesday.

Ernesto “Ernie” Lanza is leaving his position as deputy executive director at the Municipal Securities Rulemaking Board to join the Washington office of Greenberg Traurig.

City attorneys should be aware of possible conflicts between the issuer they represent and its employees, financial advisors and counsel about whether to self-report that bond documents failed to disclose violations of a continuing disclosure agreement, regulators and lawyers warned Thursday.

The Municipal Securities Rulemaking Board plans to conduct a survey of municipal advisors later this month to help it develop professional qualification exams.

The Municipal Securities Rulemaking Board plans to soon unveil a new price discovery tool on EMMA that will allow investors to compare the prices and yields of municipal securities that share the same characteristics.

The Securities and Exchange Commission on Monday filed securities fraud charges against a nonprofit charter school operator in Chicago for misleading investors of $37.5 million of bonds about conflicts of interest that could have jeopardized the ability to pay debt service.

Issuers are disclosing more failures to comply with their continuing disclosure agreements than in past months - a development some market participants said stems from a Securities and Exchange Commission's program encouraging them and their underwriters to self-report instances in which bond documents falsely stated the issuer was in compliance with its CDA.

A group of lawyers is urging the Treasury Department to modify its procedures for state and local government series securities so the department does not have to completely halt SLGS sales every time the federal government nears its congressionally-mandated debt limit.

Securities and Exchange Commission member Daniel Gallagher said Thursday that pension and other post-employment benefit liabilities need to be made more transparent for investors, and argued for a universal "disclosure baseline" that all cities should use.