Senators Merkley and Levin Call for Final Rules Implementing Merkley-Levin Provisions of Dodd-Frank (sometimes known as the Volcker Rule)

Senators Merkley and Levin submitted a letter to the heads of the Federal Reserve Board, the Comptroller, the CFTC, the FDIC and the SEC requesting they end the delay in issuing a final version of the "Merkley-Levin Provisions" of Dodd-Frank which the letter says are "commonly referred to as the Volcker Rule." The Senators expressed frustration that, months after the deadline (July 21, 2012) by which the Merkley-Levin Provisions were to become effective, the lack of unanimous agreement among regulators with respect to the Merkley-Levin Provisions, which, according to the letter, is a result of "staff-level differences," has been obstructing progress on finalizing the rule implementing the Merkley-Levin Provisions. The Senators urged that, if the various regulators could not reach agreement on a common version of the Merkley-Levin Provisions, each involved agency should adopt its own version of the Merkley-Levin Provisions.

View letter discussing the Merkley-Levin Provisions in full here (links externally to Senator Merkley's website).For a general discussion of the Merkley-Levin Provisions, link to this attached Cadwalader memorandum published shortly after Dodd-Frank was adopted.To read the Merkley-Levin Provisions of Dodd-Frank, link to Section 619 of Dodd-Frank.