It is not often that, having made blunt and detailed predictions that were disregarded at the time, one gets not only to say "I told you so," but also to undo the failures. Chair Atkins has that opportunity.

The Trade-Through Rule will hold on for a bit longer, rules of such complexity cannot be quickly rescinded and the entities that benefit from the rule will fight a rear-guard action. But it will just be a delaying action.  

Firms and investors should consider what…

Rule 15c2-11 is intended to prevent broker-dealers from quoting securities without a reasonable basis for the price at which they quote. It had been in existence for 50 years, and had applied only to equity securities. Examining the literal wording of the rule, the prior SEC Chair seized an opportunity to apply it to transactions in debt securities. In a rush to expand the regulation, the SEC did not consider whether there might be very substantial differences between equity markets and debt…

The concept of "disparate impact" removes the relationship between principles of morality and the laws against discrimination because it makes illegal conduct that is not only not malevolent, it is not intentional. If conduct causing disparate impact is to be illegal without any intent, it should follow, at a minimum, that there is some publicly-announced standard of equal results that lenders must meet.  In the absence of either a lender's bad intent, or an announced standard that a…

Chair Atkins raises important concerns about the risks that come with regulators collecting massive amounts of personal and financial information. The Consolidated Audit Trail, for example, may be of value to U.S. regulators, but perhaps it is of more value to bad actors, who could be unconstrained as to its use. Further, why does it make sense to put FINRA in the position of defending this information against every hacker in the world; it is not a task for which FINRA should be made…