FINRA Chairman and CEO Richard G. Ketchum delivered a speech regarding the crisis of confidence in the markets at the FINRA Annual Conference and various steps that the regulators were taking, and that firms should take, to restore confidence. Chairman Ketchum began by discussing changes made to FINRA's regulatory program. He proclaimed that the 2013 Risk Control Assessment survey would become a central part of FINRA's risk-based examination program. Because of this, he encouraged firms to complete the survey. He said that the FINRA would be approving its membership application program

Chicago Federal Reserve Bank Senior Policy Advisor, John W. McPartland, authored a paper in which he discussed altering the financial markets in order to slow trading and allow market participants more chances to compete with some High-Frequency Trading ("HFT") strategies. According to the paper, although HFT may in general be a good thing, HFT strategies run counter to good public policy and inflate transaction costs with limited benefits for liquidity and pricing. McPartland argues that his proposals would help make security and derivatives markets fairer to mutual funds and individual

SIFMA announced the appointment of former three-term U.S. Senator Judd A. Gregg as CEO and the appointment of former U.S. Representative and SIFMA Acting President CEO, Kenneth E. Bentsen, Jr. as President. Click here to view announcement in full (links externally to SIFMA website).

The attached SIFMA Amicus Brief addresses whether, under the "listing theory," plaintiffs' foreign-cubed claims are within the scope of Exchange Act Section 10(b) and, thus, may be sued upon in federal court, because the securities that the foreign plaintiffs purchased on foreign exchanges also happened to be cross-listed on a U.S. exchange. Click here to view Amicus Brief (links externally to SIFMA website).

On March 25, 2013, the SEC published in the Federal Register a proposed rule, Regulation Systems Compliance and Integrity ("Regulation SCI") under the Exchange Act, for public comment. The SEC is extending the time period in which to provide the Commission with comments. Proposed Regulation SCI would apply to certain self-regulatory organizations (including registered clearing agencies), alternative trading systems ("ATSs"), plan processors, and exempt clearing agencies subject to the SEC's Automation Review Policy (collectively, "SCI entities"), and would require these SCI entities to comply