The American Institute of Certified Public Accountants ("AICPA") held its 2015 "Digital CPA Conference," which featured, among others, guest speakers SEC Chair Mary Jo White and SEC Chief Accountant James V. Schnurr. The focus of the conference was innovation in accounting firms. In his remarks, Mr. Schnurr highlighted issues around: (i) effective disclosure, (ii) communications of audit committees and (iii) high-quality auditing standards.

Eight of ten voting members of the Financial Stability Oversight Council ("FSOC") testified at a House Financial Services Committee oversight hearing on FSOC's agenda, operations and structure. In opening remarks, Representative Jeb Hensarling (R-TX) observed that FSOC has earned "bipartisan condemnation" through measures such as (i) its designation of non-bank financial institutions as "systemically important financial institutions" ("SIFIs") and (ii) its annual report, that was intended to identify emerging threats to financial stability, but "omit[ted] any references to specific government

In a recent paper, Mercatus Center scholars Scott Sumner and Chad Reese addressed the need to demystify the oversight of monetary policy. They also suggested that arguments centered on the nuances of the Fed Oversight Reform and Modernization Act (FORM), which was passed recently by the House, ignore the bigger picture: the bill could allow the Fed and the Congress, at long last, to speak the same language. The authors noted that the FORM bill would require the Fed to develop a standard methodology for making monetary policy decisions, which they argued would allow Congress to understand how

The U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Texas issued an order granting summary judgment against former Enron president, COO, and CEO Jeffrey K. Skilling. The judgment concludes the SEC's civil case, which was stayed by the court beginning in 2004 until the outcome of criminal proceedings and appeals.

FINRA introduced a new category of trade submissions that it called clearing-only, non-regulatory reports. The reports can be used by firms to submit to clearing OTC transactions in equity securities that have been reported previously through a FINRA facility. FINRA specified that clearing-only, non-regulatory reports cannot be used for regulatory reporting purposes, and that firms may use these reports only when their regulatory reporting obligations to FINRA have been satisfied through other submissions (tape reports - i.e., submitted for public dissemination purposes - or non-tape reports).