Capital Markets

  • February 06, 2025

    CFTC Signals Openness To Regulate Sports Event Contracts

    The U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission announced a public roundtable to discuss its regulation of contracts tied to high-profile sporting events Wednesday, with the acting chair bemoaning the commission's current policy as a "sinkhole of legal uncertainty."

  • February 05, 2025

    House Republicans Target CFPB's Small-Biz Rule For Repeal

    House Republicans at a Wednesday hearing sought to build momentum for reversing the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau's small-business loan data rule, casting it as harmful to smaller banks while Democrats argued the real danger is the Trump administration itself.

  • February 05, 2025

    FDIC Letters Show It Met Crypto With 'Resistance,' Hill Says

    The Federal Deposit Insurance Corp.'s acting Chairman Travis Hill said Wednesday that he has jump-started a "comprehensive review" of the regulator's past crypto-focused communications with supervised banks, releasing a trove of documents he said shows that many banks abandoned their cryptocurrency plans after the FDIC met them with "resistance."

  • February 05, 2025

    'Dog Eat Dog' Contract Raises Connecticut Justice's Hackles

    A Connecticut Supreme Court justice on Wednesday challenged private equity firm members fighting a former member's trial court victory in a breach suit over the partnership, suggesting that the winner may have had a viable fiduciary duty claim over the "dog eat dog" operating agreement that apparently allows members to "screw" a minority shareholder.

  • February 05, 2025

    Schwab To Add Oversight To End TD Ameritrade Buy Suit

    The Charles Schwab Corp. has agreed to implement an antitrust compliance program designed by an independent consultant in order to settle claims from a proposed class of retail investors who alleged they were forced to pay increased transaction costs for trades following the Schwab-TD Ameritrade merger in 2020.

  • February 05, 2025

    EmpiresX Crypto Platform Operators Ordered To Pay $129M

    A Florida federal court has entered a default judgment against two Brazilian co-founders and the head trader of the EmpiresX trading platform, ordering them to pay more than $129 million for allegedly taking investor funds in a fraudulent commodity pool scheme and lying that their money wasn't used to trade cryptocurrencies.

  • February 05, 2025

    Chicago's Climate Suit Belongs In Federal Court, Judge Hears

    The city of Chicago should not be allowed to take environmental deception claims against the nation's largest oil producers back to state court because the city's suit targets conduct performed largely for the federal government, a judge heard during a Wednesday hearing.

  • February 05, 2025

    Judge Won't Pause Crowdfunding Case After Fraud Indictment

    A target of the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission's first crowdfunding enforcement action can't pause that three-year-old case to defend himself against unrelated charges that he ran a pump-and-dump scheme with a hallucinogenic mushroom company, a Michigan judge ruled Wednesday.

  • February 05, 2025

    Crypto Expert Witness Ruling Flouts Precedent, Justices Told

    The founder of cryptocurrency service Tornado Cash has asked the U.S. Supreme Court to undo what he called an "unprecedented" order from a Manhattan federal judge to disclose whom he might call as an expert witness at his upcoming money laundering and sanctions-dodging trial.

  • February 05, 2025

    Entertainment-Focused SPAC Raises $200M To Purse Merger

    Special purpose acquisition company K&F Growth Acquisition II began trading publicly Wednesday after raising $250 million in its initial public offering, which will be used to help the SPAC merge with a target in the in-person and mobile experiential entertainment sector.

  • February 05, 2025

    Missile-Defense Firm Karman Launches Plans For $400M IPO

    Missile-defense and space programs company Karman Holdings Inc. launched plans Wednesday for an estimated $400 million initial public offering that would raise fresh funding for the private equity-backed business and its shareholders, represented by Willkie Farr & Gallagher LLP and underwriters' counsel Latham & Watkins LLP.

  • February 05, 2025

    SEC Moves Under Trump Risk 'Chilling' Staff, Grewal Says

    The reported scaling-back of the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission's crypto enforcement unit by the new Republican SEC majority could make staff at the agency more fearful of doing their jobs and put investors in jeopardy, former SEC enforcement director Gurbir Grewal said Wednesday.

  • February 05, 2025

    Paxos' Top Atty Takes CLO Spot At Crypto Co. Kraken

    Cryptocurrency exchange Kraken has tapped the general counsel at crypto trust company Paxos to serve as its new chief legal officer.

  • February 05, 2025

    Activist Nominates 4 Director Candidates To Kenvue Board

    Activist investor Starboard Value LP on Wednesday unveiled its slate of four director candidates to be nominated to consumer products company Kenvue Inc.'s board of directors, saying that significant changes to the board are necessary to ensure the company is managed and overseen in a manner consistent with the best interests of its shareholders.

  • February 04, 2025

    FINRA Fines Broker $3.2M Over Securities Lending Biz

    Broker-dealer Apex Clearing Corp. has agreed to pay the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority $3.2 million to end first-of-its-kind claims that the firm failed to abide by customer protection rules with its fully paid securities lending program, including by misrepresenting how it would compensate participants, leaving certain customers vulnerable to potential tax consequences.

  • February 04, 2025

    Wells Fargo Clears 2 More Consent Orders Amid Rehab Efforts

    The Federal Reserve said Tuesday that Wells Fargo & Co. has exited a pair of mortgage-related consent orders from more than a decade ago, another step forward in the banking giant's regulatory rehabilitation efforts.

  • February 04, 2025

    Sen. Banking Chair Sets 100-Day Dash For Crypto Legislation

    Senate Banking Committee Chair Tim Scott, R-S.C., said Tuesday that he intends to pass crypto legislation out of his chamber in the first 100 days of the new administration with the help of a working group composed of committee chairs in both chambers of Congress.

  • February 04, 2025

    AI Clean Energy Co. SPAC Suit Should Be Zapped, Judge Says

    A federal magistrate judge has recommended dismissing, without prejudice, a derivative shareholder suit accusing the top brass of Stem Inc., an artificial intelligence-driven clean energy company, of making misleading statements leading up to a conflicted merger with a special purpose acquisition company, saying no one should have to "connect the dots" to figure out what is specifically being alleged against them. 

  • February 04, 2025

    Robinhood Halts Super Bowl Offerings After Request By CFTC

    Robinhood Markets' derivatives subsidiary pulled back its planned offering of Super Bowl online trading markets on Tuesday, one day after announcing the offering, saying the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission requested that it stop.

  • February 04, 2025

    SEC Receiver, Atty Agree To Settle Fraud Transfer Claims

    A court-appointed receiver for a U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission case has reached a settlement with parties who allegedly received hundreds of thousands of dollars' worth of transfers from a fraudulent foreign exchange trading scheme, including the attorney and family of a convicted executive.

  • February 04, 2025

    Coinbase Taps BigLaw Firms In Bid To End Crypto 'Debanking'

    Crypto exchange Coinbase urged regulators Tuesday to clarify that banks can offer crypto custody and execution services, submitting a letter featuring a report from three BigLaw firms asserting that federal laws and regulations already allow banks to wade further into digital asset activities.

  • February 04, 2025

    SEC Says Pre-IPO Stock Firm Was $70M Boiler Room Scheme

    The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission has accused several New York City residents of participating in a fraudulent scheme in which sales representatives allegedly used high-pressure tactics to induce investments in private companies that had not yet held initial public offerings, while benefiting from the hidden fees charged to investors.

  • February 04, 2025

    PE-Backed Identity Software Firm SailPoint Primes $1B IPO

    Cybersecurity firm SailPoint on Tuesday unveiled plans for an estimated $1 billion initial public offering that would mark its return to public markets three years after a private-equity buyout, represented by Kirkland & Ellis LLP and the underwriters' counsel, Davis Polk & Wardwell LLP.

  • February 04, 2025

    Trump Taps GOP Senate Staffer For Treasury Bank Policy Role

    President Donald Trump on Monday nominated Luke Pettit, a senior adviser to Sen. Bill Hagerty, R-Tenn., and former Federal Reserve policy analyst, to become the U.S. Department of the Treasury's top bank policy official.

  • February 03, 2025

    Trump Orders Plan For Creating US Sovereign Wealth Fund

    President Donald Trump on Monday signed an executive order calling on the U.S. Department of the Treasury and U.S. Department of Commerce to come up with a plan to create a U.S. sovereign wealth fund and said the social media app TikTok could potentially be put in the proposed fund.

Expert Analysis

  • How Judiciary Can Minimize AI Risks In Secondary Sources

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    Because courts’ standing orders on generative artificial intelligence and other safeguards do not address the risk of hallucinations in secondary source materials, the judiciary should consider enlisting legal publishers and database hosts to protect against AI-generated inaccuracies, say attorneys at Lankler Siffert & Wohl.

  • Bitnomial Suit Highlights Crypto Turf War Between SEC, CFTC

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    An outcome favoring Bitnomial in its recent lawsuit against the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission could reinforce the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission's authority and limit the SEC's reach in the crypto arena, illustrating the need for Congress to delineate boundaries between the agencies, says Tonya Evans at Penn State Dickinson Law.

  • Nvidia Case's Potential Impact On Securities Class Actions

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    In Nvidia v. Ohman Fonder, the U.S. Supreme Court could strip lower courts of their long-standing ability and obligation to holistically weigh all relevant facts supporting plaintiffs' allegations of securities fraud, which would have a wide-ranging impact on securities fraud class actions in the U.S., say attorneys at Labaton Keller.

  • How Attorneys Can Break Free From Career Enmeshment

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    Ambitious attorneys can sometimes experience career enmeshment — when your sense of self-worth becomes unhealthily tangled up in your legal vocation — but taking the time to discover and realign with your core personal values can help you recover your identity, says Janna Koretz at Azimuth Psychological.

  • UCC Article 12 Offers Banks A Chance To Dive Into 'DePINs'

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    The 2022 update to Article 12 of the Uniform Commercial Code, which provides a legal framework for decentralized physical infrastructure networks, could offer trade and commodity finance banks attractive opportunities, like the energy-related DePIN projects that have recently made headlines, says Chris McDermott at Cadwalader.

  • Short-Seller Implications Of 10th Circ.'s Overstock Decision

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    The Tenth Circuit's Oct. 15 decision in Overstock Securities Litigation provides clarity on the pleading standard for a market manipulation claim under the Exchange Act, and suggests that short sellers might not be able to rely on the fraud-on-the-market presumption typically invoked by securities plaintiffs, say attorneys at Paul Weiss.

  • Lawyers With Disabilities Are Seeking Equity, Not Pity

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    Attorneys living with disabilities face extra challenges — including the need for special accommodations, the fear of stigmatization and the risk of being tokenized — but if given equitable opportunities, they can still rise to the top of their field, says Kate Reder Sheikh, a former attorney and legal recruiter at Major Lindsey & Africa.

  • Crypto.com's Suit Against SEC Could Hold Major Implications

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    Crypto.com's recent lawsuit against the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission could affect the operation and regulation of crypto markets in the U.S., potentially raising more questions about the SEC's authority to regulate the industry when it's unclear whether another agency is ready to assume it, say attorneys at McGuireWoods.

  • Opinion

    Judicial Committee Best Venue For Litigation Funding Rules

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    The Advisory Committee on Civil Rules' recent decision to consider developing a rule for litigation funding disclosure is a welcome development, ensuring that the result will be the product of a thorough, inclusive and deliberative process that appropriately balances all interests, says Stewart Ackerly at Statera Capital.

  • The Strategic Advantages Of Appointing A Law Firm CEO

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    The impact on law firms of the recent CrowdStrike outage underscores that the business of law is no longer merely about providing supplemental support for legal practice — and helps explain why some law firms are appointing dedicated, full-time CEOs to navigate the challenges of the modern legal landscape, says Jennifer Johnson at Calibrate Strategies.

  • Don't Phone A Friend: Disclosing Friendships With Executives

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    The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission's recent settlement against a former Church & Dwight chairman for violating proxy disclosure rules by neglecting to disclose his friendship with an executive officer amid a CEO search illustrates the perils of relying solely on responses to questionnaires circulated to boards, say attorneys at BCLP.

  • The Ups And Downs Of SEC's Now-Dissolved ESG Task Force

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    The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission's Climate and ESG Enforcement Task Force, which was quietly disbanded sometime over the summer, was marked by three years of resistance from some stakeholders to ESG regulation, a mixed record in the courts and several successful enforcement actions, say attorneys at Crowell & Moring.

  • Series

    Beekeeping Makes Me A Better Lawyer

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    The practice of patent law and beekeeping are not typically associated, but taking care of honeybees has enriched my legal practice by highlighting the importance of hands-on experience, continuous learning, mentorship and more, says David Longo at Oblon McClelland.

  • SEC Fine Shows Risks Of Nonpublic Info In X, LinkedIn Posts

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    The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission recently announced a settlement with DraftKings over charges arising from posting material nonpublic information on the CEO's social media accounts, highlighting that information posted to company websites and social media sites does not automatically qualify as "publicly disclosed" for purposes of Regulation FD, say attorneys at O'Melveny.

  • Anticipating Jarkesy's Effect On Bank Agency Enforcement

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    Following the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision in U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission v. Jarkesy, federal courts may eventually issue decisions on banking law principles and processes that could fundamentally alter the agencies' enforcement action framework, and the relationship between banks and examiners, says Brendan Clegg at Luse Gorman.

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