A single sympathetic SEC chairman’s conversion enabled the options exchange’s launch

Evidence

Casey’s attitude to “speculation” was quite different from that of his predecessor Manuel Cohen, and he held Milton Cohen in high regard, trying to lure him back from private practice to become his “personal mentor” (Sullivan interview; Rissman interview). Casey’s respect for Milton Cohen meant that the latter was able to secure a meeting with him to go through the arguments in favor of an organized options exchange. Although members of his staff were still skeptical, Casey was convinced, saying to Cohen: “Tell me what kind of order you need from the Commission to get started.” (Milton Cohen, in CBOE/OCC 1998b) On April 26, 1973, the Chicago Board Options Exchange opened. — Donald MacKenzie, An Engine, Not a Camera, 668

Categorization

• CANDY: A regulatory leadership change in 1971 converted a four-foot stack of unresolved documents into an approved exchange by 1973 — ‘tell me what kind of order you need to get started.’
• XREF: Parallel to how idiosyncratic individual advocacy matters in other market-creation episodes; contrasts with impersonal institutional accounts.