House Spending Bill Cuts SEC Budget, Curbs CAT Data Collection
The legislation would also block enforcement of the unpopular Staff Accounting Bulletin 121 on digital assets.
House Appropriations Committee legislation that’s up for debate would trim the Securities and Exchange Commission’s budget by $589 million and prohibit the agency from implementing or collecting information related to the Consolidated Audit Trail, or CAT.
The Financial Services and General Government bill would allocate $2 billion for operating expenses at the SEC, $589.3 million below the fiscal 2025 budget request and $144.3 million below the fiscal 2024 enacted level.
The cut in funds would limit the SEC’s “aggressive Enforcement Division to $644 million, which represents a $168 million decrease” from President Joe Biden’s budget request, according to a summary of the bill by House Appropriations Committee Chairman Tom Cole, R-Okla.
Policy riders attached to the bill would also:
- prevent the SEC’s proposed climate/ESG rulemaking, which would require public companies to disclose climate-related risks and emissions in their SEC filings;
- prohibit the SEC’s proposed rulemaking on swing pricing, “which would artificially alter the share price in a one-size-fits-all manner,” according to Cole;
- prohibit the SEC from implementing or enforcing Staff Accounting Bulletin No. 121, which implements “harmful digital asset requirements,” according to Cole.
Both houses of Congress have voted on a bipartisan basis to repeal Staff Accounting Bulletin 121, which requires certain financial institutions that maintain custody of digital assets to hold them as liabilities on their balance sheets.