SEC Uses Exam Priorities to Tackle Biden Policy Agenda
The SEC’s 2021 examination priorities mark an unsurprising and sharp shift from the last four years to many of the priorities Gary Gensler highlighted at yesterday’s confirmation hearing (see Client Report INVESTOR15). Ahead of revising controversial proxy rules, Commission staff will assess the extent to which proxy voting is in what it describes as investor’s “best interests” on climate-change and ESG concerns, looking also at the extent to which business-continuity risk takes climate change into account.
IMF Staff: Negative Rates, No Problem
The IMF today released a blog post concluding that negative rates over the past eight years have had largely beneficial effects in terms of easing financial conditions without resulting inflation. The blog post also concludes that negative rates have had no adverse financial stability impact despite lower bank earnings, while financial markets and MMFs have operated well.