DOL Fiduciary Rule Hearing Starts Tuesday

The Certified Financial Planner Board of Standards, the Financial Planning Association, the National Association for Fixed Annuities as well as Cetera Financial Group are among the groups testifying Wednesday.

Wayne Chopus, president and CEO of IRI, said in its statement requesting to testify that the group remains "extremely troubled and disappointed" by Labor's refusal to extend the comment period on the new rule as well as postpone the hearing until sometime after the comment period closes, "as has been the Department's longstanding custom."

Gomez denied on Nov. 15 a request by 18 trade groups to extend the comment period deadline, which remains Jan. 2.

Jennifer Eller, a principal in Groom Law Group's Retirement Services Practice Group and Fiduciary Practice, told Labor in its request to testify that while Groom's "clients are working diligently to provide substantive comments" on the proposal by Jan. 2, Groom remains concerned that Labor only provided "thirty-seven working days (excluding the two days that the Department will hold the hearing) in the comment period."

Gomez, Eller noted, "has asked groups to take a close look at the proposal and acknowledged that 'there have been so many changes since the last rule came out.'"