Firm culture, conflicts of interest, outsourcing, anti-money laundering and liquidity will be among major FINRA initiatives in 2016.

SEC Chair Mary Jo White defended the SEC fiscal year 2017 budget request before the House Appropriations Subcommittee on Financial Services and General Government.

The Chicago Mercantile Exchange Group added exceptions to its requirement to aggregate commonly held positions for products that are not subject to federal position limits.

The SEC granted a temporary exemption from compliance with security-based swap data repository ("SDR") rules to give potential SDR registrants additional time to "thoroughly" complete applications.

The CFTC fined a London-based company $525,000 for violating the speculative position limit for wheat futures contracts. It also fined a U.S. subsidiary $140,000 for submitting false information to the CFTC in connection with the positions.