Congresswoman Maxine Waters, Ranking Member of the House Financial Services Committee, today released the following statement in reaction to the annual report of the Financial Stability Oversight Council (FSOC).  Waters praises the FSOC’s work to monitor systemic risk and identify potential vulnerabilities in the financial system. 

Ranking Member Waters also calls on members of the Council to pay close attention to a series of bills which will soon be considered by the House Financial Services Committee.  These bills would amend Title VII of the Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act.  Title VII reforms the market for derivatives and therefore changes to it may affect systemic risk and issues under the jurisdiction of the FSOC.

I welcome the Financial Stability Oversight Council’s (FSOC) annual report and look forward to reviewing in greater detail the Council’s research and recommendations.  I appreciate the Council’s diligence and efforts to outline for Congress areas of systemic risk that remain, such as the structural vulnerabilities in the wholesale funding markets; reference interest rates and LIBOR manipulation; cybersecurity; and the imperative of housing finance reform.

The Council’s work is critical to ensuring our federal financial regulators are working collaboratively to identify systemic risks and respond to emerging threats to financial stability.  Since Wall Street reform is directly linked to the Council’s capacity to fulfill its mission, I am also pleased that the Council in its report encouraged continued development of Dodd-Frank derivatives reforms “as they are essential to increase transparency and to mitigate risk that could arise from the over-the-counter (OTC) derivatives market.”

I therefore call on the Council to focus its attention on a series of bills the House Financial Services will soon consider that would amend Title VII of Dodd-Frank Wall Street reforms.  Since implementation of Title VII directly impacts the Council’s ability to effectively monitor and protect our nation’s financial system, I believe it is the incumbent upon the FSOC to provide an analysis of these derivatives proposals and share with the Committee how their enactment would affect FSOC’s statutory responsibilities to identify threats to the financial system. 

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