To amend the Commodity Exchange Act and the Securities Exchange Act of 1934 to specify how clearing requirements apply to certain affiliate transactions, and for other purposes.
Latest action. Received in the Senate and Read twice and referred to the Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition, and Forestry.
(This measure has not been amended since it was reported to the House on October 26, 2015. The summary of that version is repeated here.)
(Sec. 1) This bill amends the Commodity Exchange Act and the Securities Exchange Act of 1934 regarding clearing requirements for certain affiliate swap transactions to revise the conditions under which an affiliate of a person that qualifies for an exception from clearing requirements may itself qualify for such exceptions.
The affiliate must be:
directly and wholly-owned by another affiliate qualified for the exception or an entity that is not a financial entity;
not indirectly majority-owned by a financial entity;
not ultimately owned by a parent company that is a financial entity; and
an affiliate that does not provide any services, financial or otherwise, to any affiliate that is a nonbank financial company supervised by the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System.
The bill disqualifies for the exceptions, however, any affiliate that is:
a swap dealer, a security-based swap dealer, a major swap participant, a major security-based swap participant, or a commodity pool (all disqualified under current law);
a bank holding company (not, as under current law, only a bank holding company with over $50 billion in consolidated assets);
a specified kind of private fund;
an employee benefit plan or government plan under the Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974 (ERISA);
an insured depository institution;
a farm credit system institution;
a credit union;
a nonbank financial company supervised by the Federal Reserve Board; or
an entity engaged in the business of insurance and subject to state or foreign government capital requirements.
Unless the Commodity Futures Trading Commission or the Securities and Exchange Commission determines it is in the public interest, however, the exception from clearing requirements shall not apply to an affiliate that is itself affiliated with: (1) a major security-based swap participant; (2) a security-based swap dealer; (3) a major swap participant; or (4) a swap dealer.
The summary continues for 5 more paragraphs. Read it in full on Congress.gov
Written by analysts at the Congressional Research Service and published on Congress.gov, not by Civibrief. Summarized at the "Passed House amended" stage on November 16, 2015. It describes the bill, it is not the legal text.
Where is it in the process, and what happens next?
4 steps remain before this bill could become law.
The record's latest action, on November 17, 2015: Received in the Senate and Read twice and referred to the Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition, and Forestry.
- Clearing the committees it was referred to, and being scheduled for a floor vote
- Passage by the House
- Passage by the Senate
- The President's signature. If the President vetoes it, two-thirds of both chambers must vote to override.
How likely is it to become law?
Civibrief does not forecast outcomes and this page has no opinion about this one. What the record supports is a base rate, which is a fact about the whole pile, not a prediction about this measure.
In the 114th Congress (2015-16), 329 of the 10,233 bills and joint resolutions introduced became law, about 3.2 percent. That count covers every measure at every stage, including the many that never left committee.
This one is not there yet: 4 steps are still outstanding, listed above.
Has anyone actually voted on it?
No. No roll call in this Congress cites this measure. That is the ordinary outcome: most measures never reach a recorded floor vote, and a committee ends most of them simply by not acting.
A vote is not the only thing that happens to a measure. Hearings, markups, and referrals are all recorded actions, and none of them is a vote of the full chamber.
Who is behind it?
Gwen Moore (D-WI) introduced it on March 4, 2015, and 3 members have since signed on as cosponsors.
They come from both major parties: 1 Democrat, 2 Republicans.
Cosponsoring is a formal signature on the text. It is not a commitment to vote for the measure, it does not bind anyone's party, and a long list of cosponsors is a measure of attention rather than of prospects.
How long has it been in play?
It was introduced on March 4, 2015, 4208 days ago. The most recent recorded action was 3950 days ago, on November 17, 2015.
Measures do not carry over. Anything the 114th Congress has not finished by January 3, 2017 dies when the term ends, and has to be introduced again from the start in the next Congress.
Every answer above is assembled from this measure's own record on Congress.gov and from published counts of what Congress has passed before. Civibrief does not predict outcomes and takes no position on any measure.
Vote history
- HouseIn committee, no floor vote yet
- SenateAwaits House passage
- PresidentAwaits both chambers