Washington

Dealer groups and banks remain highly concerned that the Municipal Securities Rulemaking Board's proposed core municipal advisor rule could limit the services they offer, while non-dealer advisors told the Securities and Exchange Commission that the proposal needs more clarification in several ways.

The Government Finance Officers Association is trying to galvanize public officials to pressure federal banking regulators into more permissive rules classifying municipal securities as high-quality liquid assets under the liquidity coverage ratio (LCR) rule adopted last year.

Municipal issuers need to be prepared to fight against Securities and Exchange Commission efforts to directly regulate them, members of the Government Finance Officers Associations' Committee on Governmental Debt Management said Saturday.

The Securities and Exchange Commission should not approve the outline for the Municipal Securities Rulemaking Board's Municipal Advisory Representative Qualification Examination because it takes an inappropriate "one-size-fits-all" approach, the Investment Company Institute told the commission in a comment letter.

Sixteen municipal market groups are urging House members to co-sponsor a bill that would treat all investment grade and actively traded municipal securities as high-quality liquid assets under a bank liquidity rule.

The Securities and Exchange Commission has approved the Municipal Securities Rulemaking Board’s proposal to collect additional post-trade data for EMMA, the MSRB announced late Tuesday.

Municipal issuers and dealers hope that the Federal Reserve's proposal to include uninsured investment-grade general obligation bonds as high-quality liquid assets under the Fed's liquidity coverage ratio requirement rule spurs other banking regulators to do the same.

The Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System has proposed a rule that would amend the Fed’s liquidity coverage ratio requirement (LCR) to include some uninsured investment-grade general obligation municipal securities as high-quality liquid assets (HQLA), a move market participant have said matters little unless other regulators follow suit.

The Securities and Exchange Commission on Thursday charged an Atlanta-based investment advisory firm and two executives with fraud for allegedly selling investments to pension funds for the city's police and firefighters, transit workers, and other employees that were illegal under state law.

The Securities and Exchange Commission has announced that Jessica Kane will be the new director of the SEC’s Office of Municipal Securities and that Rebecca Olsen will be deputy director.