The Municipal Securities Rulemaking Board is seeking comment on draft amendments to Rules G-47 on time of trade disclosures and D-15, which defines the sophisticated municipal market professional. The draft amendments to Rule G-47 codifies existing guidance, adds additional disclosures that may be material, retires and consolidates certain elements of interpretive guidance and makes other
Two of the Federal Reserve board’s seven governors abstained from supporting the selection of former Obama aide Austan Goolsbee to become president of the Chicago Fed, according to a record of the vote. Governors Michelle Bowman and Christopher Waller, who were both appointed to the board by former President Donald Trump, withheld their support for
Tax-exempt bonds for sports stadiums are once again in the crosshairs under a bill introduced this week by Oregon Democrat Rep. Earl Blumenauer. The bill would amend the tax code – or “close a loophole,” as Blumenauer said – to eliminate the federal tax exemption for bonds that finance or refinance capital expenditures for a
Property tax cuts and expanded school vouchers will be fast tracked for consideration by Texas lawmakers after Gov. Greg Abbott included them in a list of emergency items for the legislative session. In his Thursday evening State of the State address, the Republican governor also said he will soon announce a $100 billion transportation infrastructure
The Rhode Island Housing and Mortgage Finance Corp. plans to price $135 million of special revenue bonds Wednesday to support its affordable mortgage program for first-time and lower income home buyers. The issuer, also known as RIHousing, is the state’s housing finance agency. The largest of the three tranches of Homeownership Opportunity Bonds is the
Municipals were weaker Friday ahead of a holiday-shortened week with a smaller new-issue calendar. U.S. Treasuries were firmer, and equities ended mixed. Triple-A benchmarks were cut three to 11 basis points, depending on the scale, pushing the one-year muni above 3% and the 30-year to 3.50%. UST yields fell two to five basis points. Muni-UST
A big Texas bond deal to recover extraordinary costs incurred by natural gas utilities during a fierce 2021 winter storm finally won approval Friday from a state board, paving the way for pricing next month. The Texas Bond Review Board approved the issuance of up to $3.6 billion of taxable customer rate relief bonds by
Good morning. There are decades when nothing happens. Then there are weeks when decades happen. With unerring timing, my holiday happened to coincide with one of those weeks. My apologies (and thanks!) to Jude, Jen, Miranda, Robert, Chris, Lukanyo, and George for filling in with such aplomb. Some thoughts on some of the aftershocks in
Rishi Sunak is pressing to seal a deal with Brussels on post-Brexit Northern Ireland trade rules early this week, rejecting calls from former prime minister Boris Johnson to take a more confrontational approach. Sunak’s officials held talks with their Brussels counterparts on Sunday on how to give Northern Ireland politicians a say in the application
European stocks gave up early gains on Monday, as investors weighed the prospect that the world’s biggest central banks would keep interest rates higher for longer to curb inflation. The region-wide Stoxx 600 traded flat while France’s Cac 40 eased 0.2 per cent. Trading activity was more muted as US markets are closed for Presidents’
Friday marks the first anniversary of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, an event that shocked the world by bringing large-scale conflict to European soil. US president Joe Biden’s visit to Poland at the start of the week will serve as a show of strength to Ukrainian and Nato allies in the face of Russia’s long-expected
It is not often that a Pulitzer Prize-winning dramatist gives the keynote speech at a competition policy conference. But last week in Washington, I introduced PEN America president Ayad Akhtar before he gave the lunchtime address at a conference on monopoly policy sponsored by the Open Markets Institute. The pairing wasn’t as random as it
There comes a point in many wars where the warring sides wonder what they have got themselves into. By some accounts, Vladimir Putin reached that stage in September. After a series of military setbacks, the Russian leader was showing anger — and even panic. Putin is now said to have regained his equanimity. With the
Jaime Puerta remembers the last night his life felt normal. He had dinner with his son Daniel and they joked around while flicking through old family photographs. The next morning, the former marine found Daniel unconscious on his bed with ashen skin and a blue tint on his lips. What looked like half a tablet
Good morning. It was a busy weekend in Munich as the world’s defence and security community digested almost a year of horrendous war in Ukraine, an increasingly tense US-China relationship and three ballistic missile tests by North Korea. What a time to be alive. Plus, Poland’s president Andrzej Duda used an interview with the FT’s
Polish president Andrzej Duda has called on Nato powers to give postwar security guarantees to Ukraine, on the eve of a visit to Warsaw by his US counterpart to reaffirm the west’s support for Kyiv a year into Russia’s war. Duda told the Financial Times that promises of security guarantees “would be important” for Ukraine
US president Joe Biden made a surprise visit to Kyiv on Monday in a dramatic show of American commitment to Ukraine ahead of the first anniversary of Russia’s full-scale invasion. His stopover, shrouded in secrecy owing to security concerns, comes at a pivotal moment in the war as Ukraine is gearing up for a counteroffensive
Massachusetts plans to bring $2.7 billion of taxable business-tax backed special obligation revenue bonds with a social designation, marking the largest environmental, social and governance deal to date in the municipal market. The deal is also one of the larger taxable deals in 2022 in a year that has seen a significant drop in taxable
Los Angeles International Airport received a $50 million grant from the federal infrastructure bill for terminal road improvements, among the largest dispersed from the $1 billion allocated to 85 airports nationally. The grants are the first allotment in a five-year, $5 billion airport terminal grant program funded by the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, Transportation
One of the leading contenders to succeed Boris Johnson as prime minister has said he will not stand in the forthcoming leadership contest, as other Conservative MPs prepare to launch their campaigns. Defence secretary Ben Wallace was the favourite among the Tory grassroots, with a net approval rating of +86 among party members according to