We were happy to get mentions of this week's inaugural Crane's Money Fund Symposium in several publications and stories. ignites.com, which has password-protected content, ran "Money Fund Execs Disparage Liquidity Reforms" on Monday and "SEC, White House Mull Money Fund Liquidity Plan" on Tuesday. The latter story said, "The President's Working Group on Financial Markets and the Securities and Exchange Commission are considering creating a 'private liquidity bank' for money market funds that would be paid for by funds. The idea stems from concern that the SEC's proposed liquidity thresholds for money funds are inadequate to sustain redemptions of the type that occurred last September after the Reserve Primary Fund broke the buck, said Robert Plaze, assistant director of the agency's Division of Investment Management.... A liquidity facility would be created to avoid the need for the federal government to intervene, as it did last September with a Treasury guarantee for money funds and other programs, he added. Plaze, who is co-chair of the President's Working Group's committee on money funds, made his comments during a session of Crane Data's Money Fund Symposium. Plaze said there is 'quite a degree of connectivity' between the agency and the President's Working Group. He also said the President's Working Group sees the SEC's proposed money fund rules as a 'critical component' of the government's response to the traumatic market events of 2008." Yesterday, Investment News writes "Money market funds may suffer when federal backstops expire, J. P. Morgan exec fears," which says, "Money market mutual funds would benefit from a federal program to guard against the risk of illiquidity in the markets, analysts yesterday at the first Money Fund Symposium in Providence, R.I." Finally, see Reuters' "Judge combines Reserve Primary Fund lawsuits".
