Business: Wall Street's Favorite Bureaucrat--Now

• Share

THE kids on the block in Queens where William Casey grew up called him Cyclone because his angular body seemed to be constantly in motion. The nickname still fits Casey, who is now chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission. His seven months in office have been filled with a bustle that the agency had seldom known in its first 37 years.

Under Casey's guidance, the SEC has moved briskly to enforce negotiated brokerage-commission rates on stock trades of more than $500,000, order stricter capital requirements for securities firms, tighten up corporate bookkeeping and require all companies whose stock is bought by the public to make fuller disclosures of financial information. Last week the SEC proposed new rules that would unequivocally prevent brokerage firms from using customers' cash and securities for their own purposes; the regulations would supersede New York Stock Exchange rules, which were not always obeyed. Next week Casey will conclude a month of hearings in Washington on a topic no less ambitious than the entire structure of the securities industry.

Zeal and Understanding. As if to heighten his aura of activity, Casey fills any gaps in his crowded schedule with press interviews, speaking engagements and visits to Wall Street trading floors. Such visibility is a striking contrast to the low profile maintained by the man he succeeded, Hamer Budge. Casey even matches the ebullience of Budge's predecessor, Manuel Cohen, whose activist zeal did not endear him to many securities men.

Casey, though, is held in surprising esteem by the Wall Streeters whom he regulates. "You get a sense that he listens," says William R. Salomon, managing partner of Salomon Brothers, one of the nation's largest investment banking firms, "and just as important, that he understands what you are talking about." Says an admiring Robert Haack, president of the New York Stock Exchange: "The man seems impatient with delay. Once he identifies a problem, he seems to want to solve it and move on to the next."

Casey's fans dismiss the fact that he stepped into his job with little Wall Street experience. He was a heavy contributor to the Republican National Committee and a law partner of its former chairman, Leonard Hall, before the President picked him for the SEC chairmanship last winter. The appointment ran into trouble in the Senate Banking Committee, where Casey was grilled at length about his role in three civil lawsuits between 1962 and 1965, two of which involved securities. He was finally approved by the Senate in March.