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MIT Sloan’s Gary Gensler to be nominated for chair of Securities and Exchange Commission

Prominent finance expert, a veteran of both public service and the private sector, to be nominee for top market-regulation post.
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Gary Gensler
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Gary Gensler, a leading finance expert and a faculty member at the MIT Sloan School of Management, has been picked by President-elect Joe Biden as his nominee to be chair of the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).

Gensler is a veteran of both public service and the private sector, and has been a proponent of reform and transparency in financial markets. He is perhaps best known for his influential tenure as chair of the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) during the Obama administration, from 2009 to 2014.

As CFTC head, Gensler recommended greater oversight of the financial derivatives market, which was a central element in the banking-sector crisis that emerged in 2007. Gensler also helped implement the Dodd-Frank banking reform bill, passed by the U.S. Congress in 2010, which overhauled derivatives trading.

Under Gensler, the CFTC also brought charges against five financial institutions that it claimed had been manipulating the London Inter-Bank Offered Rate (LIBOR), a benchmark interest rate used globally. That action resulted in over $1.7 billion in corporate penalties. 

The SEC is the leading finance-sector regulator in the U.S. It is intended to supervise securities markets, protect investors, and oversee financial-services firms, among other tasks.

Gensler’s nomination is subject to confirmation by the U.S. Senate.

A highly successful investment banker at Goldman Sachs for nearly two decades, Gensler moved into public service in the late 1990s. He served in the U.S. Treasury Department as Assistant Secretary for Financial Institutions from 1997 to 1999, and as Undersecretary for Domestic Finance from 1999 to 2001.

Gensler also served as a senior advisor to Sen. Paul Sarbanes, chair of the Senate Banking Committee, during the development of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act, passed in 2002. Enacted in the wake of a series of corporate scandals, that legislation revamped many corporate governance and accounting practices.

At MIT, Gensler has been professor of the practice of global economics and management, at MIT Sloan; co-director of MIT’s Fintech@CSAIL program; and a senior advisor to the MIT Media Lab Digital Currency Initiative. He has taught classes about blockchain, digital currencies, and other financial technologies, and won the MIT Sloan Outstanding Teacher Award for the 2018-19 academic year. Gensler first joined the Institute in 2018.

Along with Gregory Baer, Gensler is co-author of “The Great Mutual Fund Trap,” a 2002 book asserting, among other things, that actively managed mutual funds with higher fees generally perform worse than “passive” low-fee index funds.

Gensler began his career by working for Goldman Sachs from 1979 through 1997. At various points in his time there, he became a partner in the firm’s mergers and  acquisition department; headed its media group; led fixed income and currency trading in Asia, and ultimately became co-head of finance at Goldman Sachs.

Gensler earned a BA in economics in 1978 and an MBA in 1979, both from the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania.

Press Mentions

NPR

NPR reporter David Gura spotlights U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission Chair Gary Gensler as he takes a new approach to his role as head of the SEC. After teaching a cryptocurrency course at MIT and serving as the chair of the Commodity Futures Trading Commission under President Obama, Gensler has “promised he’ll unveil new rules across the board as part of an ambitious agenda, from cryptocurrencies to new disclosure rules,” says Gura.

Associated Press

Prof. Gary Gensler has been approved to lead the Securities and Exchange Commission, reports Marcy Gordon for the AP. The appointment signals “an emphasis on investor protection for the Wall Street watchdog agency after a deregulatory stretch during the Trump administration,” writes Gordon.

Bloomberg

Bloomberg reporter Benjamin Bain writes that Prof. Gary Gensler has been confirmed as the new head of the Securities and Exchange Commission. Bain writes that Gensler is “poised to confront everything from the fallout of the GameStop Corp. trading frenzy to the deluge of special purpose acquisition companies and the collapse of Archegos Capital Management.”

Bloomberg

Bloomberg reporters Benjamin Bain, Jennifer Epstein and Robert Schmidt spotlight the work Prof. Gary Gensler, who has been nominated as the next chair of the Securities and Exchange Commission. Gensler “not only knows how to mobilize a bureaucratic federal agency but also understands the often impenetrable ways that Wall Street makes money -- and how firms use that complexity to turn regulation in their favor.”

NBC News

NBC News reporter Martha White writes that Prof. Gary Gensler has been selected as President-elect Joe Biden’s nominee to lead the Securities and Exchange Commission. “Gensler is a terrific choice to head the agency," said Barbara Roper, director of investor protection at the Consumer Federation of America. "He’s as knowledgeable about the markets as anyone on Wall Street, so he can’t be intimidated. He’s a seasoned regulator who knows how to get things done.”

Associated Press

President-elect Joe Biden has selected Prof. Gary Gensler to serve as the next chair of the Securities and Exchange Commission, reports Marcy Gordon and Zeke Miller for the AP. Gensler “was an assistant Treasury secretary in the Clinton administration and later headed the CFTC during Barack Obama’s term. With a background of having worked for nearly 20 years at Wall Street powerhouse Goldman Sachs, Gensler surprised many by being a tough regulator of big banks as CFTC chairman.”

New York Times

Prof. Gary Gensler will be the Biden administration’s pick to lead the Securities and Exchange Commission, reports Matthew Goldstein, Lauren Hirsch and Andrew Ross Sorkin for The New York Times. “Mr. Gensler is a veteran regulator who played a central role in bringing the big banks to heel in the aftermath of the 2008 financial crisis, giving new teeth to a watchdog agency.”

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