Washington

Mary Schapiro, chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission, laid out a case for additional money market reforms before the Senate Banking Committee Thursday.

The Municipal Securities Rulemaking Board unveiled three new paid information packages Wednesday, giving market participants access to historic primary market disclosures, historic continuing disclosures and historic data for variable-rate securities.

Additional regulation of money-market mutual funds could increase short-term borrowing costs for state and local governments, leading municipalities to raise taxes or cut spending on infrastructure and other critical projects, according to a paper released Monday by a Georgetown University professor.

The Internal Revenue Service has closed an audit without changing the tax-exempt status of $219.22 million of bonds that were issued by the curators of the University of Missouri in 2006.

The Financial Industry Regulatory Authority ordered five firms — Neuberger Berman, Lawson Financial, Edward D. Jones, Estrada Hinojosa and UVEST Financial — to pay a total of nearly $120,000 in fines and restitution for violations of municipal securities rules.

FINRA will soon begin examining underwriters of municipal bonds to see if they can show they have carried out disclosure due-diligence obligations like those in a risk alert the SEC issued in March, a senior official said.

CHICAGO — Bond lawyers are beginning to require that underwriters sit down with members of the issuer’s finance team to discuss how they determined the issue price for the bonds, an IRS official said at a seminar held here on Wednesday.

As GASB prepares to vote on new standards for public pension fund accounting that would shed light on unfunded liabilities, a recently formed state and local task force is developing guidance to keep governments focused on their annual required contributions.