Statement of Commissioner J. Christopher Giancarlo on Enactment of the FAST Act

December 7, 2015

At the very center of the 2008 financial crisis was a lack of regulatory visibility into the extent of counterparty credit risk of major banks and financial institutions in global financial markets. The Dodd-Frank Act created the vehicle of swap data repositories to compile data on global swaps transactions providing international regulators with essential information necessary in the event of a future crisis. Yet, a major flaw in Dodd-Frank imposed indemnification obligations on overseas regulators in order to share this critical information, which has been preventing international data sharing for swaps transactions. As a result, seven years after the financial crisis, regulators still do not have full transparency into global counterparty credit exposure that Dodd-Frank was designed to provide.

I commend Chairman Jeb Hensarling for including a correction to this Dodd-Frank flaw in the FAST Act, which was signed by President Obama on Friday. The House and Senate Agriculture Committees also deserve a tremendous amount of credit for making this issue a legislative priority for the past several sessions of Congress. I am hopeful that this statutory fix is a signal that further steps to correct other flaws in Dodd-Frank and its implementation are possible.

Last Updated: December 7, 2015