SEC Tags Fiduciary as 'Long-Term' Action; Advocates Unfazed

Industry officials were unfazed by the Securities and Exchange Commission’s 2014 regulatory agenda citing a fiduciary duty rule for brokers as a “long-term” action item for the agency.

The SEC and Department of Labor filed their semiannual regulatory agendas with the Office of Management and Budget. The SEC filed its list of proposed and final rulemakings along with its list of long-term actions, which included its personalized investment advice standard of conduct (fiduciary) rule, with the “next action” on the fiduciary rule “undetermined.”

DOL told OMB in its filing that a redraft of its rule to amend the definition of fiduciary under the Employee Retirement Income Security Act would be released in August 2014.  

However, the Regulatory Flexibility Act specifically provides that publication of the agenda does not preclude an agency from acting on any matter not included.

“I wouldn’t read too much into the published agendas,” Duane Thompson, senior policy analyst at the fiduciary advocate fi360, told ThinkAdvisor. “If anything, I think it indicates a later than earlier date for public release” of a fiduciary rule proposal by the SEC.

Indeed, Barbara Roper, director of investor protection for the Consumer Federation of America, told ThinkAdvisor that the important point to note is that such a fiduciary rulemaking “is on the [SEC’s] agenda….That suggests to me that the [SEC] chair views it as a priority and that we are moving closer to rulemaking.”

The SEC Investor Advisory Committee subcommittee that Roper chairs just recently got the full committee to approve its recommendation on how the agency should move forward on crafting a fiduciary rule for brokers.