Political Quotes

“The architects of the Dodd-Frank legislation itself-- Senators Lincoln and Dodd on the Senate side--stated their intent to provide an explicit exemption from margin requirements for nonfinancial end users. I know that is a complicated issue to explain. I have explained it in detail already, so I will not do that again now. But acknowledging that the language for end users in the draft of Dodd- Frank was not perfect, they sent a letter, which I quoted from earlier, to then-Chairmen Frank and Peterson, stating that ``[T]he legislation does not authorize the regulators to impose margins on end-users, those exempt entities that use swaps to hedge or mitigate commercial risk.'' Despite the clarity of their intent, Dodd-Frank was not fixed in conference and regulators had interpreted that in fact the statutory language does contain an ambiguity which they interpret requires them to impose margin requirements. It is not just current or former Senators who have advocated for this clarity. Regulators have spoken out about it as well. As I mentioned earlier, in February 2013 at a Humphrey-Hawkins hearing, then-Chairman of the Federal Reserve, Ben Bernanke, identified the end-user exemption as one of the specific Dodd-Frank provisions that Congress should reconsider. I specifically asked him about it.…”