Consider it a victory lap.

With the Volcker Rule and nearly all of the Commodity Futures Trading Commission's rulemaking obligations under the Dodd-Frank Act completed, Chairman Gary Gensler, stepping down later this month, delivered his last public speech in that capacity before the D.C. Bar on Wednesday. In it, he reflected on the many challenges his Commission successfully tackled since the financial crisis.

Over time, due to the work of his staff and fellow commissioners, “bright lights of transparency are shining on the $380 trillion swaps market,” Gensler said, stressing “transparency” as the cornerstone of that transformation. The public can now see the price and volume of each swap transaction as it occurs and this information is available, free of charge, and listed in real time, “like a modern-day tickertape,” on swap data repository Websites. The CFTC also began publishing a Weekly Swaps Report to provide the public with a detailed view of the swaps marketplace.

Another success Gensler touted was mandated central clearing for financial entities, as well as dealers.

“Central clearing lowers risk and fosters competition by allowing customers ready access to the market,” he said. “Reforms have taken us from only 21 percent of the interest rate swaps market being cleared five years ago to more than 70 percent of the market this fall.”

The CFTC also solved the problem of time delays associated with swaps clearing. Five years ago, swaps clearing happened either at the end of the day or just once a week. Now, "with 99 percent of swaps clearing occurring within 10 seconds, market participants no longer have to worry about credit risk when entering into swap trades intended to be cleared,” Gensler said.

It was also an imperative to ensure that overseas operations were also corralled. AIG nearly brought down the U.S. economy through its guaranteed affiliate operating under a French bank license in London, he reminded the audience. Lehman Brothers had 3,300 legal entities when it failed. Its main overseas affiliate was guaranteed in the U.S. and had 130,000 outstanding swap transactions.

“The lessons of modern finance are clear,” he said. “If reform does not cover the far flung operations of U.S. enterprises, trades inevitably would just be booked in offshore branches or affiliates. If reform does not cover these far-flung operations, rather than reforming the financial system, we simply would be providing a significant loophole,” he said.

Gensler expressed hope that his successor would have greater resources to work with. “I continue to have faith that one day the CFTC will be funded at levels aligned with its vastly expanded mission,” he said.

Last month, President Barack Obama nominated Timothy Massad, a Treasury Department official, to replace Gensler. Massad previously served as the Acting Assistant Secretary for Financial Stability and joined the Treasury Department in May 2009 as the Chief Counsel for the Office of Financial Stability. He also later became the Chief Reporting Officer for OFS. Prior to joining Treasury, he was a partner with the law firm Cravath, Swaine & Moore in New York.