Insights

ISDA’s The Swap podcast: What Next for US Financial Markets Regulation?

What does the US election result mean for the direction of US financial regulation? Paul Atkins, chief executive of Patomak Global Partners, and Fred Hatfield, director, Intercontinental Exchange, and Patomak Senior Advisor give their views.

Two Ways Regulators Can Carry Through the Recent Executive Order on Regulatory Relief to Support Economic Recovery

Two ways regulatory agencies can effectuate the recent White House Executive Order requiring them to find ways to reduce burdens to jumpstart economic growth: 1) think creatively; and 2) consider permanent relief.

WSJ opinion: Borrower Beware: Cares Loans Carry a Steep Cost

Patomak CEO Paul Atkins writes in a Wall Street Journal opinion piece, “Borrower Beware!”

"Businesses with flexibility should seriously consider to what extent accepting the terms of federal loans or other support may be a Faustian bargain for their long-term business operations and strategy. The ultimate cost may dramatically outweigh the temporary gain."

Atkins draws on his experience on the Congressional Oversight Panel for TARP, which oversaw emergency spending in response to the 2008-09 financial crisis and discusses considerations businesses should make now before filing for federal assistance.

Bloomberg Radio: Paul Atkins on FSOC Guidance and New York Exxon Lawsuit

Patomak Global Partners CEO Paul Atkins is a guest on Bloomberg radio “Balance of Power” show and weighs in on recent action by the Financial Stability Oversight Council and the New York Attorney General lawsuit against Exxon.

Washington Examiner: What to Expect from the Jerome Powell Era at the Federal Reserve

Jerome Powell won’t run the Federal Reserve too differently than Janet Yellen would have. But, because he is not her and was not President Barack Obama’s nominee, he will start a four-year term as Fed chairman Monday while she begins as a think tanker at the Brookings Institution.

...The Powell era, however, will include another key Trump appointee, Randal Quarles, serving as the vice chairman for supervision, a position with oversight of regulatory affairs that was never filled under Obama.

Quarles, a former private equity investor and George W. Bush Treasury official, is likely to push for changes to several key features of the post-crisis rules, said Paul Atkins, chief executive of the financial services consultancy Patomak Global Partners, including new capital requirements for banks, internationally coordinated rules, and the Volcker Rule.

Patomak CEO’s Take on the Treasury Capital Markets Report: a Positive Step Toward Reform, Some Weaknesses Still Need to be Addressed

Today, Patomak Global Partners CEO Paul Atkins released a review of the Department of Treasury’s recently-released report on capital markets regulation. After eight years of anemic economic growth, due largely to increased barriers to small business financing and accelerating regulatory complexity, Treasury’s report sets forth a pragmatic approach to improving capital formation, expanding investor choice, and simplifying regulations. The report was issued in response to a February Executive Order that requires Treasury to identify policies that could advance, or conflict with, the President’s “Core Principles” on financial regulation. These Principles include making regulation efficient, empowering American investors, ending taxpayer-funded bailouts, and improving the regulatory process.  

Overall, the Report should give investors, consumers, workers, small businesses, and the financial industry alike reason for optimism. Its recommendations on expanding access to capital, securitization, and regulatory processes, Atkins writes, neatly align with the President’s objectives. The report’s recommendations on derivatives and equity market structure also largely go in the right direction.

Atkins notes, however, that the report’s section on so-called financial market utilities accepts failed regulatory approaches that are antithetical to the Core Principles. He also writes that some of the report’s recommendations related to derivatives and equity market structure are weak or misguided.

Moving forward, Atkins encourages Treasury to embrace needed reforms to financial market policies that conflict with the President’s Core Principles in its future reports on asset management, insurance, the Financial Stability Oversight Council, and OLA. Treasury should announce that it will drop its ongoing appeal of the strong March 2016 MetLife v. FSOC court ruling that limits one of FSOC’s sweeping powers to designate firms “systemically important” – an anti-competitive and costly “too-big-to-fail” label that brings about moral hazard and adds next to nothing to make the financial system more “stable.” Treasury should also endorse Congress’s effort to rein in FSOC’s full suite of designation powers and end taxpayer-funded OLA bailouts.

Click through to read the full analysis.

Bloomberg: Kroszner Says Getting Closer to Normal Wage Pressures

Patomak Senior Advisor Randall Kroszner joins Bloomberg Asia to discuss inflation, the job market, and volatility. 

Milken Institute Global Conference: First 100 Days–and the Next 1,000

Tune in at 1:45pm Eastern on May 1 to hear Patomak CEO Paul Atkins give his take on the Trump Administration’s financial markets regulatory reform efforts at the Milken Institute Global Conference.

CNBC: Atkins on Trump’s Economic Agenda

In a CNBC Squawk on the Street interview, Patomak CEO Paul Atkins discusses Trump’s agenda, economic policy ideas, and continued focus on job creation and economic growth through key legislative initiatives.

 

CNBC: Patomak CEO Paul Atkins Talks About Financial Regulatory Outlook in 2017

Patomak CEO Paul Atkins joins CNBC's Squawk on the Street to talk about the financial regulatory outlook in 2017.