Washington

The Municipal Securities Rulemaking Board is aiming to make progress on a number of high-profile projects during its board meeting next week including markup and bank loan disclosure as well as a new municipal advisor complaint system and plans to improve EMMA.

Municipal market participants are criticizing as too low the $50,000 fine that the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority imposed on Dougherty & Co. after finding the firm served as an underwriter for 54 issuers with which it had ongoing “blanket” financial advisory agreements.

Elaine Greenberg, the former head of the Securities and Exchange Commission’s municipal enforcement unit, has joined Greenberg Traurig’s Washington D.C. office as a shareholder, the firm announced Tuesday.

Republicans delegates adopted a 2016 platform at their national convention in Cleveland that supports statehood for Puerto Rico, but not for the District of Columbia. The GOP also wants to abolish the Internal Revenue Service, overhaul the federal tax code, and expand the use of P3s for infrastructure projects.

Dougherty & Co. was hit with the largest Financial Industry Regulatory Authority fine of its kind in recent years after the firm agreed to pay $50,000 for serving as an underwriter for 54 issuers with which it had ongoing "blanket" financial advisory agreements.

The Municipal Securities Rulemaking Board is providing some new information about muni trades on its Electronic Municipal Market Access (EMMA) system.

Oriental Financial Services, Hilltop Securities, Alluvion Securities and Sterne, Agee & Leach have agreed to pay a combined $133,358 for municipal securities violations uncovered by the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority.

Rep. Peter DeFazio’s bill to impose a 0.03% tax on secondary market trades of stocks, bonds and derivatives would include tax-exempt as well as corporate bonds, a spokeswoman for the Democrat from Oregon said on Thursday.

A recent study’s findings that the share of households holding municipal debt fell considerably over a 24-year period with a corresponding condensing of ownership in the hands of the wealthiest may lead to political questions related to muni debt, the study’s authors conclude.

The National Federation of Municipal Analysts wants issuers to improve their disclosures about statutory liens and how they could affect general obligation bonds following a slew of recent municipal bankruptcies where this was a key issue.