We urge you to nominate an SEC Chair who is committed to restoring corporate accountability and rebuilding robust, transparent public markets. Our country needs an SEC that will challenge powerful interests on Wall Street to better promote inclusive economic growth, while also protecting main street investors, pension plan participants, workers, and the communities in which we live.
AFR released recommendations for “Day One” policy actions by the Biden Administration in the areas of banking regulation, securities and markets regulation, and addressing systemic risk. These are actions that could be taken without a lengthy rulemaking and would make immediate progress toward a fairer
Americans for Financial Reform Education Fund signs onto a letter from Consumer Federation of America opposing the PCAOB’s proposal to weaken auditor independence standards. The proposed rule will undermine investors’ faith in the reliability of financial disclosures, and risk the integrity of our capital markets. Furthermore, the PCAOB has abused process by adopting these changes without opportunity for public comment and hurrying the SEC approval process without justification. The undersigned urge the SEC to deny the requested rule change.
AFR released a recommended set of systemic reforms outlining steps to create a safe and just financial system. These include both reversing the deregulation of the Trump years and taking positive steps to create a far more secure and inclusive financial system. The full document
By creating a blanket exemption for a broadly defined group of “finders” to effectively act as solicitors and brokers in private investment markets without being subject to any of the requirements on registered broker-dealers as regards disclosure, qualifications, obligations to customers, pricing, record-keeping, business conduct, financial resources, or compliance with FINRA rules, the Commission would abrogate its responsibilities to protect investors and to maintain fair and orderly markets.
The folk legend Robin Hood was, as every child knows, the legendary outlaw who robbed from the rich to give to the poor. But in a reincarnation of a long-running Wall Street scheme, it is the wily financiers who rob from the ordinary folk holding investment accounts at Robinhood.
The Americans for Financial Reform Education Fund is strongly urging the SEC against raising the quarterly reporting requirements for institutional investors 35-fold that would take away up to 90% of the existing reporting that is vital to market participants and researchers alike.
With this new rule, the SEC is undermining the ability of investors to use the shareholder proposal process to call companies to task on their failures to behave responsibly. Now, it will be much more expensive for small investors to submit shareholder proposals. It will be harder for them to resubmit proposals — a frequent practice — because of higher resubmission thresholds. It’s a gift of new power to irresponsible management and a blow to the cause of corporate accountability.
The SEC has released new guidance on corporate disclosures in light of COVID, which includes a recommendation that companies disclose more information about health and safety policies. We see this as a positive first step toward requiring the disclosures requested in a letter sent to the SEC last week by Americans for Financial Reform and nearly 100 other organizations.
The problems the SEC identified include fund managers’ failure to make full and fair disclosure of conflicts of interest, charging improper fees, and failure to implement policies to prevent staff from trading on material non-public information. In other words, the SEC’s examinations have shown that private equity and hedge fund managers are consistently engaged in self-dealing and overcharging investors, like pension funds that provide for the retirement security of millions of Americans.