Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. Lynn, let me start by thanking you for your generous introduction and for hosting this event at the Exchange. My thanks as well to the market participants here today. And of course, I am grateful to see my counterparts from across the Administration. Thank you all for being here and for your understanding that the views I express today are in my capacity as Chairman and do not necessarily reflect those of the SEC as an institution or of my fellow Commissioners.

There are few places more fitting to consider the future of the American financial system than this one. The New York Stock Exchange is a cathedral of capital markets, replete with the rhythms and rituals that allocate resources toward socially valued uses. Listen closely, and you can hear the hum of human ingenuity that has long echoed within these walls. Echoes that ring loudly around us today.

Step outside these doors, meanwhile, and the neighborhood itself narrates the American story. A short walk in any direction brings you to landmarks like Federal Hall, where Washington took his oath and Congress established the Treasury; to the buttonwood tree under whose ancestor two dozen stockbrokers established the forerunner of this exchange; and to the cobblestone streets that were a cradle of commerce long before Manhattan’s skyscrapers rose above them.

The square mile that surrounds us is less a place than a prologue—an opening chapter in a story that is now ours to continue. (more…)