Idea of the Week: US Chamber Recommends More SEC Focus on Munis

IDEA OF THE WEEK

US Chamber Recommends More SEC Focus on Munis

The U.S. Chamber of Commerce’s Center for Capital Markets Competitiveness has released a  135-page report on the SEC titled “Roadmap for Transformational Reform,” which recommends the  entire overhaul of the SEC, which it claims is currently “grounded in an outdated view of the world’s financial markets”.

The report recommends the expansion of the SEC from five commissioners to a seven member organization, with the stipulation that an accountant, an economist and an attorney always be included among the seven commissioners.  It also recommends that SEC senior staff should be hired for five-year appointments, renewable only following extensive review.

With regard to municipal securities, the report criticized the SEC for its “equity-centric” view of markets, and specifically recommended that more resources be devoted to municipal markets noting that “[o]ne year after Dodd-Frank mandated the creation of an independent office of municipal securities, the SEC continues to function with only two or three professional staff overseeing the entire market, as it has for the past decade.”