SIFMA Pres. testifies need for consolidated broker/dealer and advisor regulation

Securities Industry and Financial Markets Association (SIFMA) President and CEO Tim Ryan hopes to unite broker/dealers and investment advisors under a "universal standard of care."

In a testimony before the Senate Banking Committee yesterday, Ryan said: "Development of a single set of standards governing business conduct of financial institutions towards individual and institutional investors, regardless of the type of industry participant or the particular products or services being offered, would promote and enhance investor protection, and reduce potential regulatory arbitrage and inefficiencies that are inherent in the existing system of multiple regulators and multiple, overlapping rulebooks.

"Rather than perpetuating an obsolete regulatory regime, SIFMA recommends the adoption of a 'universal standard of care' that avoids the use of labels that tend to confuse the investing public, and express, in plain English, the fundamental principles of fair dealing that individual investors can expect from all of their financial services providers."