President Obama nominated Lisa Fairfax and and Hester Peirce to fill the two vacant positions on the Securities and Exchange Commission. They will join May Jo White and Kara Stein. That leaves Michael Piwowar alone with his Y-Chromosome.
Fairfax is a law professor and director for programs at George Washington’s Center for Law, Economics and Finance. Fairfax is an expert on shareholder activism.
Peirce is a senior research fellow at George Mason and director of the financial markets working group at the university’s Mercatus Center. Peirce served on Senator Richard Shelby’s staff on the Senate Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs. In that position, she worked on financial regulatory reform following the financial crisis of 2008 as well as oversight of the regulatory implementation of the Dodd-Frank Act. Peirce served at the Securities and Exchange Commission as a staff attorney and as counsel to Commissioner Paul S. Atkins
If confirmed, Fairfax would take the Democrat slot by replacing Luis Aguilar, whose term has expired. Peirce would take the Republican slot and replace Daniel Gallagher who stepped down in early October.
The President is able to placate both the right and the left with the two nominations. It will be interesting to see what direction the SEC turns to once the two new commissioners take their seats.