SIFMA today released the following statement from Randy Snook, executive vice president, in response to the approval by the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) of two proposals that seek to address extraordinary volatility in individual stocks and the broader stock markets. These proposals -- for updated market-wide circuit breakers and the establishment of a limit up-limit down mechanism that replaces the existing single stock circuit breakers -- were put forward by the national securities exchanges and the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority.
“The SEC today took another important step in helping strengthen market structure and improve investor confidence by approving these two proposals. We have been a strong proponent of these approaches since 2010 and believe that these initiatives will contribute to the stability of our markets. We are pleased to see these coming to fruition and look forward to working with the exchanges, regulators and other market participants on implementing both.”