Chair White delivered opening remarks at the meeting of the SEC Investor Advisory Committee (the "Committee"). She updated the status of current rulemakings and described what lies ahead.

SIFMA published a model Sophisticated Municipal Market Professional ("SMMP") Affirmation to meet the requirements of new MSRB Rule D-15, which will become effective on December 7, 2015. SIFMA set forth the elements of the affirmation and the dealer obligations under the MSRB Rules. According to SIFMA, until the MSRB rule changes become effective, an affirmation from an institutional customer indicating exercise of independent judgment that satisfies FINRA Rule 2111 also can be used to satisfy MSRB rules. Current affirmations will not be valid means of satisfying MSRB rules as of December 7

The NFA issued a notice to members requiring CPOs to answer a question concerning the delegation of certain responsibilities to another registered CPO when they file a pool's annual financial statement in the NFA's EasyFile system. Due to the self-executing relief in CFTC No-Action Letters 14-69 and 14-126, a commodity pool operator ("CPO") does not notify the NFA when delegating certain responsibilities to another registered CPO. For that reason, the NFA is unable to provide this information on its BASIC system. The new requirement corrects that deficiency. The new requirement will allow NFA

ISDA CEO Scott O'Malia posted an opinion titled "Trading Rules Need to Work Together" in ISDA's online news publication derivatiViews. In his commentary, Mr. O'Malia discusses the need for amendments to the U.S. swap execution facility ("SEF") rules and for general trading rule harmonization. The markets are fragmenting already, Mr. O'Malia stated. Until late 2013, trading between European and U.S. dealers comprised roughly a quarter of the euro interest rate swaps market. Now, he said, this market is traded almost exclusively between European dealers, with many U.S. entities locked out of

The North American Securities Administrators Association ("NASAA") published research indicating that investors are confused about the service and maintenance fees charged to their accounts by brokerage firms. A research firm was commissioned by NASAA to conduct a public opinion poll that surveyed over 1,000 investors with brokerage accounts across the United States. The poll asked investors about their awareness of service and maintenance fees charged by brokerages. Brokerage firms routinely charge fees to serve and maintain customer accounts. Yet, according to the findings, nearly a third of