Senator Jack Reed (D-RI) and Senator Bob Menendez (D-NJ) introduced a bill titled "Stop Illegal Insider Trading Act" (S. 702). The bill is intended to strengthen prohibitions on insider trading. Sponsored by Senator Reed, the bill amends Exchange Act Section 10 by adding language that would, among other things, explicitly forbid traders and other persons "[t]o purchase, sell, or cause the purchase or sale of any security on the basis of material information that the person knows or has reason to know is not publicly available." The bill also provides a definition of "not publicly available."

The House Subcommittee on Capital Markets and Government Sponsored Enterprises announced a hearing titled "Oversight of the SEC's Division of Enforcement." The hearing is scheduled for March 19, 2015. S ee: Press Release.

SEC Chair Mary Jo White spoke at the Corporate Counsel Institute. Her remarks focused on how the SEC has and should exercise its authority over certain kinds of enforcement actions such as disqualifications, exemptions and waivers under the federal securities laws. Chair White stated that the "ultimate objective" of the SEC's decisions to grant waivers is to "safeguard the public interest and protect investors." She explained that in order to achieve this objective, the SEC must scrutinize each waiver decision and apply the applicable legal standards uniformly to determine whether the entity

Multiple corporations, including The Hershey Company and J.M. Smuckers Co., met with the CFTC to discuss a comment letter submitted on January 22, 2015 regarding CFTC Position Limit Proposals. The comment letter argued that the CFTC-proposed rules "conflict with commercial market practices" for many commodities and could impact negatively on the ability of commercial participants in the coffee, cocoa and sugar product markets to hedge risks using ICE Futures U.S. (the "Exchange") contracts. Additionally, the letter explained that the proposed rules would "transform" the role of the CFTC from

MSRB announced that it will host a webinar to review Rule G-44 ("Supervisory and Compliance Obligations of Municipal Advisors"), as well as amendments to Rules G-8 and G-9. The webinar is scheduled for March 19, 2015. Se e: Regulatory Notice; click here to register for the Webinar. Related news: SEC Approves of MSRB Rules Regarding Supervisory and Compliance Obligations and Recordkeeping Requirements (Fed. Reg.) (October 29, 2014); MSRB Issues Regulatory Notice Regarding SEC's Approval of First Municipal Advisor Rule and Other Amendments(October 24, 2014).