The SEC named Walter Jospin Regional as Director of its Atlanta Office.

The US Department of the Treasury (“US Treasury”), acting for the US Financial Stability Oversight Council (“FSOC”), issued a proposed rulemaking aimed to implement the Qualified Financial Contract (“QFC”) recordkeeping requirements of the Dodd-Frank Act. The proposed rules would apply to financial companies with $50 billion or more in consolidated assets, financial companies designated by the FSOC, as well as financial affiliates of these companies and would require recordkeeping of positions, counterparties, legal documentation and collateral. This information is needed to help the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (“FDIC”) as receiver to, among other things, decide whether to transfer QFCs, evaluate the consequences of decisions to transfer, disaffirm or permit the termination of QFCs with one or more counterparties, and conclude whether any financial systematic risks are posed by the transfer, disaffirmation or termination of such QFCs in the case of a distressed situation. The deadline for comments is April 7, 2015.

View the US Treasure press release.

View the Federal Register notice of proposed rulemaking.

The Federal Reserve Board appointed Thomas Laubach as director of the Division of Monetary Affairs.

The FDIC named Michael J. Dean as Atlanta Regional Director.

Three Delegated Regulations of Regulatory Technical Standards required under the Credit Ratings Agencies Regulation were published in the Official Journal of the European Union:

1. Delegated Regulation for the periodic reporting on fees charged by credit rating agencies for the purpose of ongoing supervision by the European Securities and Markets Authority. This applies from January 26, 2015. 

2. Delegated Regulation for the presentation of the information that credit rating agencies make available to ESMA. This applies from June 21, 2015. 

3. Delegated Regulation on disclosure requirements for structured finance instruments. This applies from January 1, 2017.

The objectives of the CRA Regulation include strengthening the existing EU legislation on credit rating agencies, reducing financial institution reliance on external credit ratings and improving competition in the credit ratings industry.

View the Regulations.

Pursuant to a notice published in the Federal Register on January 5, 2015, the US Commodity Futures Trading Commission reopened the comment period, and issued a clarification regarding the reopened comment periods, for two position limit rulemakings. On December 9, 2014, the CFTC Agricultural Advisory Committee convened to discuss, among other things, deliverable supply exemptions for hedging positions. To allow commenters enough time to respond to questions raised at the meeting, the CFTC extended the comment periods for an additional 45 days. The CFTC clarified that, in addition to commenting on agenda issues pertaining to agricultural commodities, comments may also include the issues raised at the meeting or in the associated materials posted to the CFTC’s website. The comment period closes January 22, 2015.

View the CFTC press release.

The FDIC issued a list of state non-member banks which were evaluated for compliance with the Community Reinvestment Act. The list relates to evaluation ratings that the FDIC assigned to institutions in October 2014. All of the banks rated received either satisfactory or outstanding ratings. The CRA was instituted in 1977 in order to encourage insured banks and thrifts to meet local credit needs, including those of low-income neighborhoods. Included in the Financial Institutions Reform, Recovery and Enforcement Act of 1989, Congress mandated that the public disclosure of the results of each bank and thrift that undergoes a CRA examination.

View the monthly list of banks examined for CRA compliance.

View the January 2015 list of banks examined for CRA compliance.

The SEC introduced a pilot program intended to simplify investor analysis and comparisons of public company financial statement data. The new program will organize data provided by companies into structured data sets which can be used for bulk downloads on the SEC’s website by investors. The SEC anticipates that such data sets will be expanded in 2015 to contain data in footnotes to the financial statements.

View examples of financial statement structured data sets.

The Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve along with other regulatory agencies responsible for implementing the Volcker Rule added an additional question under the Volcker Rule Frequently Asked Questions page relating to metrics reporting and confidentiality under the Freedom of Information Act. The updated FAQs indicate that the agencies will maintain the confidentiality of the reported information to the extent permitted by law and encourages entities subject to Appendix A of the Volcker Rule to evaluate potential exemptions and ask for confidential treatment if appropriate, including under Exemption 4 of the FOIA, which exempts confidential trade secrets and commercial information from disclosure. 

View the updated Volcker Rule FAQs.