The Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) and the Securities Exchange Commission (SEC) Thursday said they will hold two joint hearings to receive testimony from market experts and the public on how to harmonize the agencies’ market regulation. The back-to-back meetings will be on Sept. 2 at the CFTC and Sept. 3 at SEC headquarters.

“Harmonizing our regulatory policies will improve market integrity by applying consistent standards to market participants. There are three areas where this review will most benefit the American public: to address gaps between the two agencies’ financial regulatory authorities, to assess the effects of regulatory overlap and to bring appropriate consistency to the two agencies’ regulation over similar products, practices and markets,” said CFTC Chairman Gary Gensler.

In late July Gensler and SEC Chairwoman Mary L. Schapiro said they were making progress in harmonizing the jurisdictional areas of the two agencies, but they told House lawmakers they may need more time beyond a Sept. 30 deadline to submit a final report on their efforts to Congress (see Daily GPI, July 23).

“We certainly will not hesitate to ask for more time,” Gensler said during a House Financial Services Committee hearing, which heard testimony from the agency heads on their progress in meeting the Obama administration’s financial regulatory reform proposals (see Daily GPI, June 18). The agencies might have an interim report for Congress by Sept. 30, he noted.

The Obama administration’s sweeping financial regulatory reform plan, which was released in mid-June, called for Congress to amend the Commodity Exchange Act and securities laws so that the CFTC and the SEC would “have clear, unimpeded authority to police and prevent fraud, market manipulation and other market abuses involving all OTC [over-the-counter] derivatives.”

The administration plan further called on the CFTC and SEC “to make recommendations for changes to statutes and regulations that would harmonize regulation of futures and securities.”

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