“(Reuters) – The U.S. Treasury Department is forming a new unit to monitor the municipal bond market, the Wall Street Journal reported, citing a Treasury official.”

“By boosting the department’s monitoring of municipal finance, the Treasury hopes to better understand the ramifications of municipal-market stresses, the newspaper quoted the official as saying.”

“The unit, which will be headed by a veteran public-finance banker at JP Morgan Chase(JPM.N), will also track state and local pensions as well as the financing of bridges, roads and other infrastructure projects, the Journal said.”

“The unit will focus on troubled borrowers and will not have the authority to write and enforce rules for the market. (r.reuters.com/qyz58v)”

“Efforts to boost oversight of the municipal bond market have taken on new urgency after Detroit’s bankruptcy and the financial problems in regions such as Puerto Rico, which has about $70 billion of outstanding debt.”

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Read full Reuters article here.