SIFMA submitted a comment letter to the Chicago Board Options Exchange ("CBOE") regarding CBOE Regulatory Circular RG14-139 and C2 Regulatory Circular RG14-040 (collectively, "the Regulatory Circulars"). The Regulatory Circulars impose new responsibilities on Trading Permit Holders ("TPHs"). In the comment letter, SIFMA asserted that the Regulatory Circulars "create new duties that go beyond interpretations of current rules" and therefore should be subject to a notice and comment period. Furthermore, the comment letter continued, the Regulatory Circulars require that firms collect, format and

The SEC declined to grant no-action comfort to Ellsworth Fund Ltd. (the "Fund), a closed-end fund registered with the SEC under the Investment Company Act that intended to omit a shareholder proposal from its proxy materials because the proposal failed to comply with Exchange Act Rule 14a-8. The proxy proposal, if adopted by shareholders, would require the Fund to make a self-tender if its market value fell below its net asset value by a specified amount. Lofchie Comment: The proxy proposal is of a type that could be inserted into the documents for any number of closed-end funds, effectively

The Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee's Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations scheduled a two-day hearing, titled "Wall Street Bank Involvement with Physical Commodities," to be held on November 20 and November 21, 2014. According to its release, the Subcommittee plans to examine the extent to which banks and their holding companies own physical commodities, such as oil, natural gas, aluminum and other industrial metals, as well as own or control businesses, such as power plants, oil and gas pipelines, and commodity warehouses. Subcommittee Chair Carl Levin (D-MI)

Sears Holding Corp. ("Sears"), the parent of Sears and Kmart, announced in a recent SEC filing that it is actively considering monetizing some of its real estate holdings by selling and leasing back certain of its real estate assets to a newly formed Real Estate Investment Trust ("REIT"). Sears' proposal could reduce its U.S. tax bill while creating a stream of rental income earned by the REIT that could escape corporate level tax. Other companies used tax-free spin-offs to move real estate off their tax books and into more tax-efficient structures, such as REITS, but House Ways and Means

Mercatus Scholar and former Congressional and SEC staff attorney Hester Peirce posted a working paper, titled "Regulating through the Back Door at the Commodity Futures Trading Commission," which argues that the informal mechanisms through which the CFTC regulates undermine public confidence and harm compliance. Ms. Peirce argues that, when the CFTC utilizes "less formal and rigorous options" - including guidance documents, staff letters and settlement agreements - public confidence in the regulatory process is eroded, compliance efforts are hindered and the Administrative Procedure Act ("APA"