Today, Congresswoman Maxine Waters (D-CA), Chairwoman of the House Financial Services Committee, gave the following opening statement at a Subcommittee hearing entitled, “Examining Private Market Exemptions as a Barrier to IPOs and Retail Investment.”

Good morning. I’d like to thank Chair Maloney for holding this hearing on an important and growing part of our financial system—the private securities markets.

In 2000, private assets under management totaled less than $1 trillion. That figure has since skyrocketed to over $5 trillion today, and recent research has indicated that private markets are growing at more than twice the rate of their public counterparts.

This enormous shift from public to private markets will undoubtedly have a wide range of impacts on all types of investors across America.

I am particularly interested in hearing more about the effects of the increasingly favorable regulatory environment for private markets, the impact that it is having on when and whether companies decide to go public, and what this means for investors.

I thank the witnesses for appearing before us today and look forward to their testimonies.

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