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Mary Jo N. Miller is Mayer Brown’s US Banking & Finance professional support lawyer, and a member of the firm’s Knowledge Management department. She uses her extensive experience as a banker and finance lawyer to help the practice stay abreast of cutting edge financing issues and products, and deliver work product of the highest quality. Mary Jo’s practice also focuses on developing form documents and other practice resources, training lawyers, and assisting in the development and implementation of technology to allow the practice’s lawyers to leverage internal and external knowledge to build deeper client relationships and deliver excellent client service.

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The era of risk-free rates has begun and the era of interbank offered rates (and this blog) is ending.

The key LIBOR rates, other than USD LIBOR, are long retired. USD LIBOR continues to exist only as a synthetic rate to aid the transition of tough legacy contracts, and that too will end in a

Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac recently provided additional details of the necessary changes to outstanding adjustable-rate mortgage loans that currently are linked to LIBOR indices.  As expected, these changes largely mirror the changes mandated in the recently enacted Adjustable Interest Rate (LIBOR) Act (“LIBOR Act”), as well as current practice for new Fannie Mae and

Attention Loan Market Participants: There are fewer than 145 days until US dollar LIBOR no longer is published on a representative basis. While some segments of the market are well advanced in transitioning from the London InterBank Offered Rate to the Secured Overnight Financing Rate, the lending market generally is behind. Given the substantial volume

As we await the Federal Reserve Board to finalize the LIBOR transition regulations set forth in its notice of proposed rulemaking – Regulation Implementing the Adjustable Interest Rate (LIBOR) Act,[1] we are grateful[2] that on 23 November 2022 the Financial Conduct Authority (“FCA”) published Consultation Paper CP22/21: Consultation on ‘synthetic’ US dollar LIBOR and feedback to CP22/11 (“CP22/21”), in which it (a) proposes to require continued publication, under an unrepresentative “synthetic” methodology, of 1-, 3-, and 6-month USD LIBOR until the end of September 2024 and (b) announced that 3-month synthetic GBP LIBOR will continue to be published until the end of March 2024, after which each will cease permanently. Comments are requested on or prior to 6 January 2023.Continue Reading Thankful for Increasing Clarity on LIBOR’s Final Fate

On 19 July 2022, the Federal Reserve Board (the “Board”) published a notice of proposed rulemaking – Regulation Implementing the Adjustable Interest Rate (LIBOR) Act, as it was required to do by Section 110[1] of the Adjustable Interest Rate (LIBOR) Act (the “LIBOR Act”),[2] which was signed into law on 15 March 2022.[3]

In its related press release, the Board notes, “Consistent with the [LIBOR Act], the proposal would replace references to LIBOR in certain contracts with the applicable Board-selected replacement rate after June 30, 2023. The contracts include those governed by [US] law that do not mature before LIBOR ends and that lack adequate fallback provisions. The proposal identifies separate Board-selected replacement rates for derivatives transactions, contracts where a government-sponsored enterprise is a party, and all other affected contracts. As required by the [LIBOR Act], each proposed replacement rate is based on the Secured Overnight Financing Rate.”Continue Reading Switching to SOFR: Proposed Rule Published to Implement the 2022 Federal LIBOR Act

Market participants have been warned not to kid themselves. The last remaining settings of the London InterBank Offered Rate—those relating to select US Dollar tenors—are scheduled to become unavailable following publication on 30 June 2023. After this final USD LIBOR publication, the sunsetting of “the world’s most important number” will be complete.Continue Reading No foolin’: USD LIBOR to sunset one year from today

With the inclusion of the Adjustable Interest Rate (LIBOR) Act (the “LIBOR Act”) as Division U of H.R. 2471, Consolidated Appropriations Act, 2022 (the “Appropriations Act”) passed by the U.S. House of Representatives on 9 March 2022 and the Senate on 10 March 2022, the United States is on the cusp of a federal solution for legacy LIBOR-linked contracts that contain inadequate fallback provisions, or none at all. Indeed, the final version of the legislation provides additional legal certainty with respect to the use of non-SOFR benchmarks not included in the earlier version of the legislation passed by the U.S. House of Representatives.
Continue Reading Consolidated Appropriations Act Advances Federal LIBOR Transition Solution

With fewer than 30 days until the cessation of LIBOR, another piece of the puzzle has fallen into place for U.S. dollar LIBOR transition. On 30 November 2021, Refinitiv, the ARRC-preferred publisher of spread-adjusted SOFR-based fallback rates, announced that its USD IBOR Institutional Cash Fallbacks (“Institutional Fallbacks”), launched on 11 August 2021 as prototype rates, are now available for use as production benchmarks.
Continue Reading Refinitiv Spread-Adjusted Fallback Rates Become Production Benchmarks

On 20 October 2021, in a Joint Statement on Managing the LIBOR Transition, the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System, Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (“CFPB”), Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation, National Credit Union Administration, Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, and State Bank and Credit Union Regulators (the “Regulators”) emphasized their expectations that supervised institutions will transition away from LIBOR in an orderly fashion by the end of 2021. Transition preparedness will be an increasing area of supervisory focus and review.
Continue Reading Financial Regulators Clarify Key LIBOR Transition Considerations But Some Questions Remain