Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System ("FRB") Chair Janet Yellen spoke at the Citizens Budget Commission. Her speech focused on the implementation of improvements since the financial crisis in the oversight of large financial institutions in the United States. Chair Yellen distinguished between the "regulation" and "supervision" of systemically important financial institutions ("SIFIs"), and argued that both have improved since the financial crisis. With regard to "regulation," Chair Yellen cited five areas in which the FRB implemented rules to improve its oversight of financial

The SEC charged the brokerage firm H.D. Vest with violating customer protection rules after failing to adequately supervise registered representatives who misappropriated customer funds. According to the SEC order, H.D. Vest, which has more than 4,500 registered representatives working typically as independent contractors who also operate tax businesses outside of their securities businesses, failed to have proper policies and procedures in place to monitor its representatives' outside business activities. The SEC found that, as a result of this failure, some representatives used their outside

FINRA released a podcast summarizing the latest notices, compliance resources and news from February 2015. The podcast highlights two recent regulatory notices: (i) Notice 15-03, which requests comments on a FINRA proposal to require alternative trading systems to submit quotation information about fixed-income securities to FINRA, and (ii) Notice 15-04, which requests comments on a FINRA proposal to disseminate additional securitized products and reduce the reporting timeframe. The podcast also mentions FINRA's new video in its ongoing series titled "A Few Minutes with FINRA." This latest

FINRA filed an immediately effective proposal with the SEC to amend FINRA Rule 3110.15 ("Temporary Program to Address Underreported Form U4 Information") to extend the expiration date of the refund program under that rule. The program was originally set to expire in July 31, 2015. FINRA is proposing the extension of the program until December 1, 2015. See: FINRA Rule Proposal: SR-FINRA-2015-005. See also: FINRA Rule Calendar (available to Cabinet subscribers only).

The SEC's approval of the MSRB proposal to amend Rules G-1, G-2, G-3 and D-13 to establish professional qualification requirements for municipal advisors was published in the Federal Register. The rule change, which was modified by two amendments based on comment letters since the original filing, establishes two new registration classes for municipal advisors, and requires a municipal advisor to be qualified in accordance with MSRB rules before engaging in municipal advisory activities. The amendments will become effective on April 27, 2015, but interested persons may comment on the rule