In his testimony before the United States Senate Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition and Forestry, Daniel J. Roth (i) reviewed the chronology of events surrounding the Peregrine fraud and (ii) outlined recommended changes that need to be made in the way customer funds are protected and the monitoring of firms for compliance with the rules. Most significantly, Roth recommends that FCMs be required to provide their customers a transparent means to view their margin held at the FCM, which would in turn be required to hold the collateral at a bank. Roth also recommended that regulators improve

FINRA issued its monthly compendium of disciplinary actions against firms and individuals. In the category of fines against firms, the most common violations related to (i) short sale violations, particularly not closing out fails, (ii) trade reporting failures under various rules and (iii) excessive mark ups with respect to debt securities. (Firms are advised to review their compliance procedures in all of these areas.) One of the more interesting disciplinary actions was against a firm that had allowed an individual to trade overnight, from the individual's home, without being subject to the

Aug 16, 2012 RRP Eligibility Criteria for Banks and Savings Associations III, Government-Sponsored Enterprises II and Money Funds IV Aug 16, 2012 Application for Banks and Savings Associations III Application for Government-Sponsored Enterprises II Application for Money Funds IV The Federal Reserve Bank of New York published eligibility criteria for financial institutions seeking to enter into reverse repos with the FRBNY.

SEC charged Oracle Corporation with violating the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA) by failing to prevent a subsidiary from secretly setting aside money off the company's books that was eventually used to make unauthorized payments to phony vendors in India. View press release in full here (links externally to SEC website). Additional Materials: SEC Complaint. See also: August 14 news entry.

Who will the regulators hire to host the dropping of the ball? View countdown here (links externally to timeanddate.com).