FINRA today announced the results of voting that took place at its 2012 Annual Meeting in Washington, D.C. Governors Elected Small Firm Governor: Kevin Carreno, General Counsel, International Assets Advisory, LLC Mid-Size Firm Governor: W. Dennis Ferguson, Executive Vice President and Director of Clearing, Sterne, Agee Leach, Inc. Large Firm Governor: Seth H. Waugh, Chief Executive Officer, Deutsche Bank Americas Governors Re-Appointed Independent Dealer/Insurance Affiliate: Mark Casady, Chairman and CEO, LPL Financial Public Governors: Richard S. Pechter, retired, and Joel Seligman, President

There will be a futures industry-wide FIA-sponsored Disaster Recovery test on October 27, 2012, in which futures exchanges, clearing houses, FCMs and service providers will simultaneously test connectivity and functionality between backup sites. View in full here (links externally to ICE website).

The CFTC Division of Swap Dealer and Intermediary Oversight issued a set of responses to frequently asked questions ("FAQs") addressing compliance obligations for CPOs and CTAs and other issues related to commodity pools. The FAQs address a variety of issues/concerns related to the compliance obligations for CTAs and CPOs raised by market participants, including compliance dates, the regulatory status of wholly owned subsidiaries of commodity pools, trading limits for purposes of complying with CFTC Rule 4.13(a)(3), AP registration requirements for persons registered under the Investment

A newspaper story reported that JPMorgan Chase Co. will allow futures and swaps customers to house excess collateral in a separate bank account as it seeks to reassure investors after losses at MF Global Holdings Ltd. and Peregrine Financial Group Inc. The new service will allow clients to automatically aggregate excess margin at JPMorgan Chase Bank N.A. The move is meant to help customers on both the buy side and sell side deal with new requirements introduced by the Dodd-Frank Act in the U.S. and similar regulations being developed in Europe. [Lofchie Comment: This is not the type of item I

The SEC (not merely the staff) issued an order permitting an issuer that is a business development company, registered under the Investment Company Act, to conduct share repurchase during a period when it is engaged in a continuous distribution of its shares. The order is subject to substantial conditions including that there is no trading market in the issuer's shares, that there are volume limits on the number of shares purchased, and that the repurchase price for any share does not exceed the then current offering price of the issuer's stock. See generally: Lofchie's Guide to Broker-Dealer