FINRA
The industry-funded body that supervises stock brokers in the United States, cited in AI policy debates as a template for regulating frontier models.
FINRA is not a government agency. It is a self-regulatory organisation, paid for by the firms it oversees, with authority delegated by the Securities and Exchange Commission. It writes rules for brokers, examines them, and can fine or bar them.
It appears in AI coverage because that structure appeals to people looking for a middle path between no rules and slow legislation. Demis Hassabis proposed a FINRA-style standards body for frontier AI: industry-funded, setting evaluation protocols, able to coordinate a slowdown, with smaller startups exempt. The obvious objection is the obvious one about any industry policing itself.