Washington

After hearing tearful requests for leniency, federal Judge Harold Baer imposed prison and fines on three former bankers convicted of municipal bond bid rigging.

Jeanine Rodgers Caruso, president of Fiscal Advisors & Marketing Inc., is the new board president of the National Association of Independent Public Finance Advisors

The Financial Industry Regulatory Authority has ordered seven firms to pay more than $260,000 in fines and restitution to customers for violations of trade reporting and other municipal securities rules.

The Securities and Exchange Commission hopes to finalize its definition of municipal advisor early next year, according to the head of the SEC's municipal securities office.

The Financial Industry Regulatory Authority and four major industry groups spent millions of dollars on lobbyists to push their agendas on Capitol Hill, while the National Association of State Treasurers was the only governmental group to report hiring lobbyists, according to annual tax forms 22 muni-related groups filed with the Internal Revenue Service.

Middle-market, fixed-income dealer firms are adding staffers to their compliance divisions, part of an expensive effort to comply with a host of new financial regulations coming from Washington, D.C., some executives said at a meeting here.

The Financial Industry Regulatory Authority has begun examining municipal bond dealers' compliance with the Municipal Securities Rulemaking Board's recently released interpretive guidance to Rule G-17, which spells out underwriters' fair-dealing obligations to municipal issuers.

Rep. Mike Coffman, R- Colo., has introduced legislation that would allow governmental and 501(c)(3) nonprofit bonds to be refunded a second time so that issuers and borrowers could save money by taking advantage of low interest rates.

Timothy Ryan, president and chief executive officer of the Securities Industry and Financial Markets Association, had the highest compensation level among the leaders of 22 self-regulatory, dealer, governmental and other groups in the muni market, according to the latest forms the groups filed with the Internal Revenue Service.

Middle-market municipal bond dealers are banding with issuers, analysts and others to form Municipal Bonds for America, a coalition created to head off threats to the tax-exempt status of munis.