Last October, Trump adviser Anthony Scaramucci, who runs the $12.4bn (£10.1bn, €11.1bn) SkyBridge Capital hedge fund firm, said the fiduciary rule, due to come into effect in April, would be repealed once the Republican candidate became president.
A month later, just days after Trump won the presidency, Scaramucci told The FT the incoming administration should dismantle the adviser reforms intended to put an end to hidden fees and conflicts of interest in the investment market.
“We’ve got to get rid of this,” he told the paper.
Now Scaramucci, who has been looking to sell SkyBridge in the hope that it will pave the way for a government role, has been named as an assistant to president-elect Donald Trump, reports InvestmentNews.
A source told the publication Scaramucci, known as ‘Mooch’, will have a general advisory role in the White House. He’s been a member of Trump’s transition team, regularly making television appearances in support of his policies.
Goldman Sachs love-in
Havard Law School graduate Scaramucci founded SkyBridge in 2005, after leaving a job in real estate investment banking with Goldman Sachs.
The hedge fund manager joins several former executives from Goldman Sachs Trump’s team following the appointment of Steven Mnuchin as Treasury secretary, while the bank’s president Gary Cohn has been hired to the top White House economic post. Another alumnus Stephen Bannon will be Trump’s chief strategist.
Fiduciary rule delays
Scaramucci’s appointment could signal the death knell for the fiduciary rule, which has been described as the US equivalent of the UK’s Retail Distribution Review (RDR).
Last week, US congressman Joe Wilson introduced a bill which could delay the implementation date fiduciary rule by at least two years, slamming the adviser reforms as overly burdensome and claiming it will make it more costly to give and receive advice.
