Washington, DC - FIA President and CEO Walt Lukken today made the following statement after the House Financial Services Committee passed H.R. 4659 to properly calibrate the capital charges contained in the Supplementary Leverage Ratio (SLR) for clearing services:
"I thank the Financial Services Committee for working on a bipartisan basis to recognize the exposure reducing nature of initial client margin in implementation of the leverage ratio rule. This legislation will provide a long-called for offset, which will lower clearing costs for end-users and provide them with greater choice of clearing services. I hope this legislation will be considered by the House of Representatives very soon."
"FIA has determined that enacting an offset would have an inconsequential impact on overall capital levels. Further, lack of such an offset would place U.S. market participants at a disadvantage to their foreign competitors, given that many other jurisdictions have already offered or plan to offer an offset for client margin in the very near future."
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FIA has been active in efforts to change the SLR to align with the risk that new capital requirements for banking organizations have significant impacts on the ability of banks to provide clearing services for their customers. FIA is working with member firms and other industry groups to educate regulators and Congress on the risk-reducing effects of clearing and preserve a strong and diverse community of clearing firms. Learn more on FIA's work on capital and other key issues.
