Individual states compete to attract businesses. NASAA consistently opposes any federal initiative to reduce regulation. This Report may suggest that there is either a disconnect between NASAA's securities regulators and the interests of their states, or it may suggest that individual states should be given greater authority as to their citizens in ways that might incentivize them to weigh costs and benefits.

From a policy standpoint, the SEC should provide the requested information for transparency and public comment purposes. The SEC may face difficulty in presenting a convincing cost-benefit analysis, however, due to the complexity of the proposals and the assumed costs and benefits.

Hanging out there is a potential legal challenge to these proposals under the . The requested data would play a crucial role in such a challenge.

With a majority in the House, Republicans should have the ability at the Congressional level to obtain greater information from the SEC, including more testimony and the extent of evidence the agency has to support cost-benefit analyses in its rule proposals. Requiring the SEC to provide more information may, among other things, enable market participants to challenge any rulemaking that exceeds the SEC's statutory authority, or to challenge any rule that was adopted without meeting the…

Although not on the same scale as the penalties imposed on broker-dealers for recordkeeping violations, this seems another instance where the penalty is arguably disproportionate to the violation. It would be one thing if there were evidence that the issuer had intentionally, or even unintentionally, failed to disclose a material problem in an employee complaint, but apparently that is not the case. Likewise, there is not a suggestion that an employee was prevented from talking to the SEC.…