Statement at the Meeting of the Asset Management Advisory Committee

Good morning. I am happy to attend this second virtual meeting of our Asset Management Advisory Committee. Thanks, as always, to Ed [Bernard] for his excellent leadership; to the Commission staff for your hard work in preparing for this meeting; and to all of you on the Committee for sharing your valuable time and what I am sure will be your thoughtful questions and commentary. This Committee spent its first six months exploring a variety of timely topics. I am happy to see the Committee now turning back to focus more on some of these same topics: retail access to private market investments, ESG, diversity and inclusion in the asset management industry, and the effects of COVID-19.

I look forward to the update this morning from the ESG Subcommittee. I have spoken publicly on the topic of ESG disclosure, noting my views that investors should be provided clear information about asset managers’ goals and assumptions in order to understand the variety of ESG investment products that are available. [1] I applaud the private sector’s efforts to bring clarity and consistency to this area. Such efforts will be helpful to the asset management industry, as well as to the Commission whose staff reviews advisers’ product disclosure, and ultimately to the investors who purchase those investments.

Moving on from ESG, I am also looking forward to today’s panels and would like to thank each of our moderators and panelists, who bring extensive expertise in these areas. The first panel on private investment returns addresses a topic integral to the question of whether and how retail investors should be able to access the private market. As for the second panel, I commend the Committee for circling back to the topic of improving diversity and inclusion in the asset management industry. I learned from and valued the prior meeting’s discussions and look forward to hearing more today, particularly from our panelists. Finally, thank you to this Committee for following up on the COVID-19 discussion. I think we (and many others) will spend months, if not years, studying the effects of this pandemic on our markets. I appreciate all of you pressing forward with this endeavor while our memories and data sets are fresh.

I will conclude by thanking you all again for undertaking such complex and challenging issues. I will be actively listening to your insights and would be interested in engaging with you to glean policy ideas in all of these areas.