The Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC) published a final rule in the Federal Register on October 9 that revises the requirements imposed on U.S. banks and federal branches of foreign banks pursuant to the short-term investment fund (STIF) rule. A STIF is a form of collective investment fund (CIF) that may be established and managed by a national bank (or a federal branch) under its fiduciary authority. Unlike other forms of CIFs, a STIF is valued based on the amortized cost of its assets rather than based on mark-to-market basis.The final rule adds safeguards designed to address

The SEC announced that Pamela C. Dyson has been named the SEC's Deputy Chief Information Officer, and will work to further modernize and enhance the agency's information technology systems. Ms. Dyson will coordinate closely with the agency's divisions and offices to maintain an innovative, secure and efficient technology infrastructure. View press release in full here (links externally to SEC website).

Federal Reserve Board Governor Daniel Tarullo gave a speech ("Financial Stability Regulation") in which he examined the sources of systemic risk, its treatment in financial regulation, and the job of creating a "financial stability regulatory system" under Dodd-Frank. Tarullo framed the decades leading up to the recent financial crisis as "essentially deregulatory," and as a period that placed light emphasis on systemic risk. As a result, he stated, legislators who were tasked with crafting a response to the financial crisis had to write Dodd-Frank "on a mostly blank slate." The product of

FINRA announced that it had fined a broker-dealer $800,000 for failing to supervise two collateralized debt obligation (CDO) traders who engaged in activities to hide a trading loss. FINRA found that the firm had failed to review the CDO Desk's trades, documentation of the traders, and the traders' emails. View news release here(links externally to FINRA website).

The ERISA Advisory Council will hold on open meeting (October 30-31) to finalize recommendations to the Secretary of Labor regarding the following issues: disability benefits for participants in defined contribution plans, current challenges and best practices concerning beneficiary designations in retirement and life insurance plans, and examining income replacement during retirement years in a defined contribution plan system.