The MSRB announced that, as part of its annual assessment to establish regulatory and other priorities, it is seeking comment on the priority issues that municipal market participants believe the MSRB should address during the upcoming fiscal year, which begins October 1, 2013. Comments Due : March 29, 2013. See: MSRB Regulatory Notice 2013-06.

FDIC Chairman Martin J. Gruenberg gave a speech at the Institute of International Bankers' Annual Washington Conference reviewing U.S. and international regulatory efforts to develop a framework governing the orderly resolution of systemically important financial institutions ("SIFIs"), particularly those with extensive cross-border operations. In terms of progress in the U.S., Chairman Gruenberg stated that the FDIC and Federal Reserve are currently in the process of reviewing the first round of "living wills" submitted by large bank holding companies and foreign banking organizations

The SEC issued (i) a Risk Alert for investment advisers as to compliance with its custody rule and (ii) a related Investor Bulletin designed to inform advisory clients how to monitor their assets and protect their accounts from theft or misuse of their funds and securities by their advisers. According to the SEC, the alert was issued after a review of recent examinations by the SEC's Office of Compliance Inspections and Examinations ("OCIE") showed that, among firms that had significant deficiencies, one third had custody-related violations (oddly, the alert does not give a percentage of all

The Treasury will soon publish new forms of Model 1 and Model 2 FATCA Intergovernmental Agreements ("IGAs") that can be used by countries which do not have existing tax treaties or tax information agreements with the United States, International Tax Counsel Danielle Rolfes announced at the Federal Bar Association Tax Section annual conference on March 1. These new forms of IGA will include additional relevant provisions, such as confidentiality provisions and procedural rules, that are typically found in tax information exchange agreements. This new Model 1 IGA will only be in the non

SIFMA today released the following statement from Ira Hammerman, senior managing director and general counsel, regarding the SEC's request for data and other information to help the agency consider whether to write new rules implementing a uniform fiduciary standard of conduct for brokers and investment advisers. "We welcome the SEC's continued focus on this important issue for individual retail investors. We've long supported a uniform fiduciary standard of care for brokers and investment advisers who provide personalized investment advice to individual retail investors. We've been expecting