http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE7022HJ20110103Republicans may starve financial reform of cash
By Dave Clarke and Roberta Rampton
(Reuters) - Republicans in the new Congress could put the budget squeeze on two powerful regulatory agencies to slow President Barack Obama's crackdown on Wall Street.
A Democratic-controlled Congress pushed through the Dodd-Frank bank reform laws last year and regulators were counting on a big budget boost to police the $600 trillion over-the-counter derivatives market -- blamed for much of the excess behind the 2007-2009 financial crisis. But the last Congress failed to deliver on the funding, and that will be even harder to obtain with Republicans vowing to cut spending as they take control of the House of Representatives and boost their rolls in the Senate.
Republican say they want to review the expansion plans of regulators. "Once you turn the money loose, it's a little harder to stop that train," said Representative Randy Neugebauer of Texas, who will head the House Financial Services oversight subcommittee. Before lawmakers agree to dole out funds for the Securities and Exchange Commission and the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, Republicans want more time to study whether the spending is warranted, Neugebauer told Reuters.
The delay could give a reprieve to big Wall Street players ranging from Goldman Sachs to BlackRock who, through their lobby groups, have been pressing regulators to slow their furious pace to impose a new rule book on the financial sector called for by the reform law. Republican Representatives Spencer Bachus, the incoming chairman of the financial services committee, and Frank Lucas, the incoming chairman of the agriculture committee which oversees the CFTC, also wrote to regulators urging delay in the rules-making process...
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