“To meet our mission of protecting investors, maintaining fair, orderly, and efficient markets, and facilitating capital formation, the SEC has a lot of regulatory work ahead of us,” Gensler said in an accompanying statement on Friday. “I look forward to collaborating with my fellow commissioners and the dedicated staff to propose and finalize rules that will strengthen our markets, increase transparency and safeguard investors.”
While the two Republican commissioners can vote no on new amendments and rules, the five member commission has a Democrat majority.
Areas Gensler cited as priorities for amendments or rulemaking include the following:
• Disclosure relating to climate risk, human capital, including workforce diversity and corporate board diversity, and cybersecurity risk.
• Transparency around stock buybacks, short-sale disclosure, securities-based swaps ownership and the stock loan market.
• Investment fund rules, including money market funds, private funds and ESG funds.
• Unfinished work directed by the Dodd-Frank Act of 2010, including securities-based swaps and related rules, incentive-based compensation arrangements and conflicts of interest in securitizations.
• Enhanced shareholder democracy.
• Special purpose acquisition companies (SPACs).
The SEC “historically has embraced a transparent, methodical and rigorous rulemaking process to ensure its rules reflect sound policy, transcend political differences, and thus enable our registrants to operate in a consistent, predictable regulatory regime,” the GOP commissioners said.
But with many of the specific rulemakings Gensler identified in his agenda, “the commission and its staff undertook an even more rigorous and extended process” to solicit industry and public input,” Peirce and Roisman said.
For most of the specific rulemakings that the agenda would reopen, the SEC and staff “undertook an even more extended and rigorous process to obtain public input,” they added.
Both commissioners said they hope “Gensler will reconsider the need to revisit freshly minted rules,” but look forward to working with him and fellow commissioners on both the agenda and “on addressing issues of perennial importance such as elder investor fraud and small business capital formation.”