After regaining the House majority in last year's elections, Republicans haven't been shy about raising their newfound voices.
On the other hand, when House Financial Services Chairman Spencer Bachus, R-Ala., speaks, the audience has to strain to hear the courtly and soft-spoken Alabamian. That doesn't mean, however, that he's diffident about flexing his legislative muscle from his position atop one of the largest committees in Congress.
Mr. Bachus, 63, has led the committee in conducting hearings that have put pressure on the Securities and Exchange Commission and in spearheading legislation that seeks to curb the implementation of the massive Dodd-Frank financial reform law.
“I don't think anyone would be surprised with his aggressive attitude toward the SEC in particular,” said Duane Thompson, president of Potomac Strategies LLC and a former official at the Financial Planning Association. “The hearings he has had reflect a broad-based dislike for Dodd-Frank.”
Yet Mr. Bachus' gentlemanly manner also imbues his conduct of legislative business. He listens as much as he talks.
For instance, in the spring, the 10-term legislator is expected to introduce formal legislation that would authorize one or more self-regulatory organizations for investment advisers.
In September, Mr. Bachus released a “discussion draft” of the bill at a hearing that focused in part on an SEC report giving Congress three options for increasing adviser examinations: allowing the SEC to charge user fees for exams, establishing a self-regulatory organization, or expanding the jurisdiction of the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority Inc. to include advisers who are dually registered as broker-dealers.
At the hearing, Mr. Bachus heard objections from investment adviser groups, who stridently oppose Finra as an adviser SRO. He also heard from state securities regulators, who worry that an SRO would usurp their oversight authority, which is set to expand under Dodd-Frank to include all advisers with assets under management of less than $100 million.
Although he has voiced support for Finra's becoming the adviser SRO, Mr. Bachus demonstrated this fall that he's willing to consider other points of view.
Brian Hamburger, managing director of compliance consultant MarketCounsel who met with Mr. Bachus in the lawmaker's district office in late September. anticipated being shuffled off by a busy member of Congress.
Instead, the session lasted for about 30 minutes. At one point, Mr. Bachus expanded the talk to include four of his staff members who were piped in from Washington via videoconference.
“He was very engaged in the conversation and very inquisitive about the small to midsize entrepreneurial, independent investment advisers and how they might be impacted,” Mr. Hamburger said.
In order to be effective in 2012, Mr. Bachus must take more conciliatory tone than his fellow House Republicans, something he has proved he can do. For instance, he suggested at a hearing this fall that the SEC deserved a funding increase — a rare utterance for a Republican and one that could turn off his GOP colleagues.
Another obstacle for Mr. Bachus is the growing concern about congressional insider trading. He made more than 200 stock and option trades in 2008, according to The Wall Street Journal. He denies any impropriety and says he stopped all trading in 2010.
But when he tried in mid-December to move to a committee vote a bill that would clarify that insider trading laws apply to members of Congress, GOP leadership told him to slow down — an unusual rebuke to a committee chairman.
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