Congress Plans SEC Oversight Hearing for July 20

Just days after the Senate passed the landmark financial services reform bill on July 15, the House Financial Services Subcommittee on Capital Markets, Insurance, and Government Sponsored Enterprises, chaired by Rep. Paul Kanjorski (D-Pennsylvania), plans to hold an oversight hearing Tuesday, July 20, to examine the current state of the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), its priorities, and the near term challenges the agency faces. SEC Chairman Mary Schapiro will be the only person testifying.

While the obvious “big challenge” the agency faces is implementing the scads of changes set out in the reform bill, the SEC is already busy setting up new offices at the securities regulator to police the market. The SEC announced on July 16 that the SEC will create three new specialized units within the agency’s Division of Corporation Finance–the division that reviews public company filings–to focus on large financial institutions, asset-backed securities and other structured products, and securities offering trends.