A Bloomberg editorial entitled, "Money-Market Funds Should Kick Their Buck-a-Share Habit", says, "Money-market funds, like their Wall Street banking kin, are learning how to fend off new regulations meant to prevent a replay of the financial crisis of 2008. One fund company, Federated Investors Inc., is even threatening to sue. The ploys seem to be working, and might even derail proposals to make the $2.6 trillion industry safer. That would be a shame because the Securities and Exchange Commission, which regulates the funds, is only halfway through a job it started more than two years ago. The agency should finish its work by adopting additional measures to prevent the sort of panicked run on the funds that helped kick the credit crunch into high gear. Here's where we stand: In 2010, the SEC ordered money-market funds to hold more cash, have investments that mature more quickly and diversify their portfolios. To the lobbyists and some of the biggest fund companies, this stopgap was enough. They say they have all the evidence they need: Money-market funds withstood the turmoil of Europe's sovereign-debt crisis, last summer's congressional debt-ceiling stalemate and the loss of the U.S.'s prized AAA credit rating. True, money funds weathered these threats. But let's be honest: At no time were markets on the verge of matching the 2008 global financial meltdown, when disaster was averted only through intense government and central bank intervention."
