Obama chooses Mary Schapiro as first woman SEC chairman

US President-elect Barack Obama has chosen a veteran regulator to head the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), the beleaguered agency that has come under a lot of criticism by lawmakers for failing to prevent the global financial meltdown, senior Democratic officials said yesterday.

The selection of Mary L Schapiro, who would be the first woman to chair the SEC on more than an interim basis, follows a series of high-profile controversies that have raised doubts about its competence as the chief enforcer of Wall Street under the leadership of its current chairman, Christopher Cox. The SEC's failure to detect Bernard Madoff's alleged $50-billion fraud before it was revealed last week has prompted even Cox himself to question the agency's performance (See: SEC to investigate in-house flaws to nail Madoff)

Other prominent appointees include Gary Gensler to head the Commodity Futures Trading Commission and Daniel Tarullo for a Federal Reserve seat. Gensler is a former Treasury official in the Clinton administration. Tarullo is a Georgetown Law professor who also worked for President Clinton.

Schapiro, a Wall Street regulator for 20 years with a reputation for tenacity, is likely to push the SEC to become more aggressive in policing the financial industry and advocating the agency's interests as lawmakers push for an overhaul of the financial regulatory structure, according to former officials and colleagues.

Schapiro, 53, has a history of attracting support from Republicans and Democrats. President Ronald Reagan appointed her as a commissioner at the SEC, where she served for six years and eventually was named acting chair by President Bill Clinton. He later made her the chief of the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC).

The fact that she has led both agencies could make it easier for the Obama administration to merge the functions of the two agencies as part of a broad regulatory overhaul expected next year. Key regulators and lawmakers have advocated such a move, arguing that the bifurcation of duties created a gap in oversight that contributed to the financial crisis.