The Commission is amending its regulations to reflect the reassignment of responsibilities, including delegations of authority, resulting from its recent reorganization of Commission staff, which involved the replacement of the former Division of Clearing and Intermediary Oversight with two newly established divisions: The Division of Swap Dealer and Intermediary Oversight and the Division of Clearing and Risk. Effective Date: April 16, 2013. View Final Rule in full here (links externally to CFTC website).

FINRA issued a fine of more than $1 million against a firm for failing to provide best execution in certain customer transactions involving non-convertible preferred securities executed on one of its proprietary order management systems, and for failing to have an adequate supervisory system and written supervisory procedures in place. FINRA found that the firm had programmed a faulty pricing logic into its automated systems that only incorporated quotations published on the primary listing exchange for each non-convertible preferred security. As a result, in instances when there was a better

FINRA has proposed amending FINRA Rule 5250, which prohibits any payment by issuers or issuers' affiliates and promoters to a member for publishing a quotation or acting as a market maker, to allow arrangements that are provided for by the rules of a national securities exchange. The proposed amendment reflects the fact that exchanges have implemented and are considering means of incentivizing market-making, including the use of voluntary programs that would be funded through fees by issuers or affiliates of issuers. View Proposed Rule Change here (links externally to FINRA website).

The Senate Committee on Finance is holding a committee hearing on Wednesday, April 17th, at 10 a.m. for the President's Budget for Fiscal Year 2014. Senators Max Baucus (D-MT) and Orrin G. Hatch (R-UT) released statements. View hearing here (links externally to Senate Finance website). See also: Baucus Statement on the Administration's FY2014 Budget; Hatch Statement at Finance Hearing Examining the President’s Fiscal Year 2014 Budget.

Various measures to fix the unexpected consequences of derivatives provisions in the Dodd-Frank Act, and to require the Securities and Exchange Commission ("SEC") to conduct cost-benefit analyses of regulations, were discussed during a hearing today of the Financial Services Subcommittee on Capital Markets and Government Sponsored Enterprises. The following is a summary of the legislation which the subcommittee discussed: H.R. 634, the Business Risk Mitigation and Price Stabilization Act of 2013, introduced by Reps. Michael Grimm (R-NY), Gary Peters (D-MI), Austin Scott (R-GA) and Mike