The SEC’s New Line-Item Disclosure Rules for Asset-Backed Securities: MOTS or TMI?

Abstract

Despite the lack of a dominant explanation for the level of risk assumed by investors in asset-backed securities in the period preceding the financial crisis, the U.S. Congress proposed and passed new disclosure prescriptions addressing various aspects of the secondary mortgage market as part of the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act. This essay asks whether certain disclosure provisions embraced in Dodd-Frank and the related regulations of the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission are merely new and necessary components of a disclosure infrastructure that the SEC has been building for years for the protection of investors and markets — more of the same (MOTS) — or whether they represent unnecessary window dressing (or worse yet, harmful overregulation) in calling for excessive additional information — too much information (TMI).

Keywords: Dodd-Frank, secondary mortgage market, asset-backed securities, disclosure

JEL Classification: G18, G21, G28, G38, K20, K22, K40