§78qq Small Business Capital Formation Advisory Committee

Summary

Creates a Small Business Capital Formation Advisory Committee inside the Commission to give advice on the Commission’s rules, regulations, and policies about protecting investors, fair markets, and helping small companies raise money. The committee focuses on capital raising by emerging, privately held small businesses and publicly traded companies with less than $250,000,000 in public market value, trading in their securities, and their public reporting and governance rules. The committee must not give advice about the Commission’s enforcement program. The committee includes the Advocate for Small Business Capital Formation plus 10 to 20 members the Commission appoints. Those members must come from people who represent emerging companies, their professional advisors, investors, minority- or women-owned small businesses, smaller public companies and their advisors and investors, and marketplace participants. There are three non-voting members appointed by the Investor Advocate, the North American Securities Administrators Association, and the Administrator of the Small Business Administration. Appointed members listed above in the law under subparagraph (B) and the NASAA and SBA appointees serve 4-year terms. The committee elects a chair, vice chair, secretary, and assistant secretary, each for 3-year terms. The committee must meet at least four times a year when called by the chair, and can also be called by the Commission; the chair must give written notice at least 2 weeks before a meeting. Members who are not full-time U.S. employees may be paid up to the daily equivalent of the annual rate for level V of the Executive Schedule under section 5316 of title 5 and receive travel expenses like intermittent government workers under section 5703 of title 5. The Commission must provide staff, review the committee’s findings, and promptly issue a public statement assessing each recommendation and saying what action, if any, it will take. The Federal Advisory Committee Act (5 U.S.C. App.) does not apply to this committee.