A record amount of feedback on the Department of Labor’s proposed conflict-of-interest rule will be reflected in the final version, said Timothy Hauser, deputy assistant secretary of labor for program operations, at the National Press Club on Tuesday.
Addressing an Investment Management Consultants Association gathering, Mr. Hauser said, “I have little doubt that the rule is going to change.”
Mr. Hauser defended the need for an updated standard to address practices like IRA rollovers that did not exist when the rule was originally made. Core goals are to have advisers disclose potential conflicts and to put clients’ interest first.
“This marketplace has grown up in ways that are very, very conflicted,” Mr. Hauser said. ”Our intention is not to straitjacket (retirement industry providers and investment advisers) so much as to let the firms decide what they want to do.”
Lisa Bleier, managing director for public policy at the Securities Industry and Financial Markets Association, argued the rule as proposed is too complex and should be re-proposed. “There is too much at risk here,” Ms. Bleier said in an interview after the event.