Kabuki Theater at the Senate Banking Committee Starring SEC Chair Gensler

If you visit the SEC's website, you will find two different press releases of Chair Gensler's September 12, 2023, testimony before the United States Senate Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs:

Testimony of Chair Gary Gensler Before the United States Senate
Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs (Sept. 12, 2023)
https://www.banking.senate.gov/imo/media/doc/gensler_testimony_9-12-23.pdf
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Oral Testimony of Gary Gensler Before the United States Senate Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs (Sept. 12, 2023)
https://www.sec.gov/news/testimony/gensler-oral-testimony-091223

Oh, you didn't know that there was a difference between old-fashioned "testimony" and "oral testimony"? Well consider this extract from the Senate Banking Committee's Rules of Procedure and Jurisdiction

RULE 4.—WITNESSES

(a) Filing of statements.—Any witness appearing before the Committee or Subcommittee (including any witness representing a Government agency) must file with the Committee or Subcommittee (24 hours preceding his or her appearance) 30 copies of his or her statement to the Committee or Subcommittee, and the statement must include a brief summary of the testimony. In the event that the witness fails to file a written statement and brief summary in accordance with this rule, the Chairman of the Committee or Subcommittee has the discretion to deny the witness the privilege of testifying before the Committee or Subcommittee until the witness has properly complied with the rule.

(b) Length of statements.—Written statements properly filed with the Committee or Subcommittee may be as lengthy as the witness desires and may contain such documents or other addenda as the witness feels is necessary to present properly his or her views to the Committee or Subcommittee. The brief summary included in the statement must be no more than 3 pages long. It shall be left to the discretion of the Chairman of the Committee or Subcommittee as to what portion of the documents presented to the Committee or Subcommittee shall be published in the printed transcript of the hearings.

(c) Five-minute duration.—Oral statements of witnesses shall be based upon their filed statements but shall be limited to 5 minutes duration. This period may be limited or extended at the discretion of the Chairman presiding at the hearings

Y'know, the silliness just never seems to end when it comes to government and regulation. It is all designed to exalt form over substance and ensure that make-work and pretence takes precedence over actual work and accomplishment. 

I watched Chair Gensler's appearance before the Senate Banking Committee. Sadly, not much was accomplished by the Committee in terms of holding the SEC Chair accountable. Everyone delivered scripted performances and stayed in character. What we got was five-minutes of each Senator's statements and complaints about unanswered letters and how my staff will get back to your staff at a later date. What we taxpayers, we victims of securities fraud, we advocates for Wall Street reform got from the Senate hearing was an afternoon of Kabuki theater. Not much in the way of governing. Not much in the way of regulation. Just a lot of air time with a preponderance of air . . . hot air, at that. All of which did little more than waste valuable time during which the SEC should have pursued an enforcement agenda but for the fact that staff is otherwise assigned to drafting oral testimony, and testimony, and the rest of this nonsense.

In the first paragraph of the published remarks from his just-testimony testimony, Chair Gensler offered these stirring comments:

Good morning, Chairman Brown, Ranking Member Scott, and members of the Committee. Thank you for inviting me to testify today. As is customary, I’d like to note that my views are my own as Chair of the Securities and Exchange Commission, and I am not speaking on behalf of my fellow Commissioners or the SEC staff.

In contrast to the above dull prose, in the first paragraph of the published remarks from his oral-testimony testimony, Chair Gensler offered these markedly different and clearly extemporaneous comments:

Good morning, Chairman Brown, Ranking Member Scott, and members of the Committee. Thank you for inviting me to testify today. As is customary, I’d like to note that my views are my own as Chair of the SEC, and I am not speaking on behalf of my fellow Commissioners or the SEC staff.

Oh my! How much better the second, oral version is than the first, non-oral version. What a feat of oration to echo the very sentiments you committed to writing yet expand upon those sentiments without actually altering them to the extent that they are different. If I didn't know better, I would guess that Chair Gensler's testimony was written by Pierre Menard, the acclaimed but often overlooked author of Don Quixote. 

How nice. How absolutely lovely it is that Senators and the Chair of the SEC have nothing better to do with their time. Submit your proposed testimony but don't actually deliver what you submit but offer a shorter "oral" version. Which raises the question as to why the Senate wastes time having someone speak aloud the words that are already submitted in written form.

Then there's the nature of the appearance before the Committee. Questions are asked for which no answer really seems expected -- it's an excuse to bloviate. Then answers are given that aren't actually answers but deflections or double-talk. Then Senators complain that they had sent written requests for information that the SEC never responded to, to which the Chair of the SEC either feigns ignorance or promises that his people will call your people and, hey, maybe we'll do lunch? 

Why does it matter? Why am I angry?

For starters, the SEC's Whistleblower program is a quagmire of delay and often involves unwarranted hostility misdirected at claimants. 

Then there's the fact that the SEC's enforcement agenda is hobbled by extensions of times and adjournments that is the byproduct of mismanagement - or lack of management.

Further, Chair Gensler's overly-ambitious rulemaking efforts have likely redirected Staff from the prompt adjudication of whistleblower claims and from the timely pursuit of fraudsters by Enforcement. 

In addition to the above, I'm still waiting for a response to this: UPDATE: Bill Singer, Esq. Files Form TCR With SEC Seeking Investigation Of FINRA Election Interference
https://www.brokeandbroker.com/7143/bill-singer-finra-election-sec/

Also READ:

Lord Voldemort On Wall Street: When DOJ, SEC And FINRA Will Not Name Names (BrokeAndBroker.com Blog / July 10, 2023)
https://www.brokeandbroker.com/7108/craffy-monmouth-doj-sec-finra/

DOJ filed an Indictment and published this Press Release:"U.S. Army Financial Counselor Charged with Defrauding Gold Star Families." SEC filed a Complaint and published this Press Release: "SEC Charges Former Army Financial Counselor Who Defrauded Gold Star Family Members." And yet, despite all of that, neither DOJ nor the SEC will name the name of the financial counselor's employer in the Indictment, Complaint, or two Press Releases. Making matters even more ridiculous, FINRA expelled the counselor and barred the counselor's brokerage firm; however, FINRA will not name the employee's name in its AWC settlement expelling the firm or in its Press Release publicizing that expulsion.

After Thanking Very Helpful Whistleblower,The SEC Then Stabs The Tipster In The Back (BrokeAndBroker.com Blog /  April 12, 2023)
https://www.brokeandbroker.com/6986/sec-markopolos-whistleblower-thank-you/

There is the effective regulation of Wall Street. Then there is what I call the mere "appearance" of regulation. Effective regulation proactively detects fraud, pursues the fraudster, stops the fraud, and protects the investing public -- all of which entails harvesting tips, analyzing data, conducting interviews, filing charges, and sending trial staff into court. In contrast, modern-day regulation has devolved into self-serving publicity by senior regulators posting endless amounts of podcasts, videos, speeches, bulletins, guidances, alerts, and press releases. The bureaucracy tells you what it would like to do rather than what it has accomplished; hence, the appearance of regulation rather than the substance.

A Form Of Lunacy Has Overtaken The SEC (BrokeAndBroker.com Blog /  March 16, 2023)
https://www.brokeandbroker.com/6926/sec-lunacy-rulemaking/

A form of lunacy has overtaken the Securities and Exchange Commission. Those in charge seem to have lost any concept of how to rationally manage a finite amount of resources -- both human and otherwise. Unwilling or incapable of stopping, the SEC continues its excessive resort to rulemaking and rule-amending.

Time To Overhaul SEC Whistleblower Program (BrokeAndBroker.com Blog /  December 5, 2022)
https://www.brokeandbroker.com/6785/sec-owb-whistleblower/

After a decade of existence, it is time for the United States Securities and Exchange Commission's Office of the Whistleblower to provide timely updates to whistleblowers and their legal counsel after a Form WB-APP is submitted in response to a published Notice of Covered Action. The federal regulator's lack of timely communication with whistleblowers often devolves into counter-productive hostility that is inappropriately directed at individuals attempting to further investor protection.

• SEC
• Gensler
• Senate
• Pierre Menard
• Kabuki
• Testimony
• BrokeAndBroker
• Bill Singer