Your Guide to the Volcker Rule

After a three year wait (over a year beyond the deadline mandated by the Dodd-Frank Act), a consortium of U.S. regulators released the final Volcker Rule.  Under the rule, banks will be prohibited from engaging in proprietary trading and from owning more than a three percent stake in hedge funds and other private funds. The rule does allow banks to engage in underwriting of securities, market-making for their customers and hedging for “risk mitigation.” A …