A Senate panel is scheduled to question CFTC Chairman Gary Gensler and SEC Chair Mary Jo White about the status of Dodd-Frank's implementation as it moves into its third year. The CFTC and SEC officials will appear before the Senate Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs Committee to discuss topics such as derivatives and the Volcker Rule. The hearing, "Mitigating Systemic Risk in Financial Markets through Wall Street Reforms," is set for Tuesday, July 30, 2013. Lofchie Comment: One of the things that I have learned from watching the Dodd-Frank hearings is that the process would work much better

Economist Craig Pirrong ( Streetwise Professor) argues that the CFTC's defense of its stance on the residual interest proposal for FCMs in the face industry opposition "is purely legalistic, and does not even attempt to address the fundamental economic issues," which Pirrong argues includes "negative impacts of the regulation on liquidity, costs, and systemic risk." Pirrong asserts that the CFTC is hiding behind the legalisms in order to force through a proposal, despite the fact that it will increase costs and risks to users of futures. Lofchie Comment: The specific CFTC rule proposal to

The SEC charged the former CEO of a Houston-based investor-relations firm with insider trading in the securities of multiple clients. Lofchie Comment:Public companies should consider whether it is feasible to institute trading compliance procedures as to corporate service providers (other than investment banks) that obtain access to inside information. I say "other than investment banks" because investment banks already implement such procedures as to their employees, and it is unlikely that there is anything that the corporate issuer could do to supplement that. But other types of firms, such

The SEC has charged West Clark Community Schools and its municipal bond underwriter with providing bond investors with false information regarding annual financial information and notices. The SEC also charged Randy G. Ruhl, who heads the public finance and muni bond department at City Securities, for the school district's misconduct. Lofchie Comment: There has been a very significant pick-up of enforcement actions against governmental issuers. See: SEC Press Release; SEC Order Against West Clark Community Schools.

The GAO has issued a report examining the effects of the financial crisis of 2007-2008 on the insurance industry, finding that the negative effects of the crisis were quite concentrated, hitting primarily AIG and a number of other insurers involved in financial insurance or the mortgage market. The report addressed the following issues: What is known about how the financial crisis affected the insurance industry, The factors that affected the impact of the crisis on the insurers and policyholders, The types of actions that have been taken since the crisis to help prevent or mitigate potential