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Securities
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December 10, 2024
Robinhood Seeks Arb. For Remaining Meme Stock MDL Suits
Stock trading platform Robinhood urged a Florida federal court to send to arbitration the seven remaining individual suits brought against it as part of a multidistrict litigation over the platform's decision to freeze trading in certain so-called meme stocks amid a social-media fueled run on shares of those issuers.
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December 10, 2024
SEC Says Ex-Rep Defrauded Investors With Short-Term Bets
A former registered representative of broker-dealer Western International Securities Inc. has agreed to pay over $2.1 million to end U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission allegations he orchestrated a scheme to defraud retail clients by recommending costly investment strategies, and then covered up their "substantial" losses with phony financial statements.
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December 10, 2024
SEC Outlines Municipal Adviser Exam Process
The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission's Division of Examinations has issued a risk alert outlining its process for selecting municipal advisers to examine, how advisers can prepare for exams, and the types of information examiners may request.
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December 10, 2024
Chancery Awards Ajamie $13M In Cell Partnership Fight
Boutique law firm Ajamie LLP has won a Delaware Court of Chancery ruling that clients in a more-than decade-long multi-site battle over dozens of AT&T cellphone partnerships owe Ajamie about $13 million in legal fees despite a court finding that a formal fee-sharing agreement is unenforceable.
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December 10, 2024
Pastor Targeted Churchgoers In $6M Crypto Fraud, CFTC Says
The U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission announced Tuesday that it has sued a Washington state pastor in federal court for allegedly targeting Spanish-speaking individuals, including members of his congregation, with a cryptocurrency multilevel marketing scheme worth at least $5.9 million.
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December 10, 2024
4th Circ. Casts Doubt On Broker's FINRA Challenge
A Fourth Circuit panel wondered Tuesday whether it was too soon to hear one North Carolina broker's constitutional challenge against the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority, with the circuit judges pointing out that FINRA's case against the broker was not yet over.
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December 10, 2024
SEC Says Xtreme Fighting CEO And GC Defrauded Investors
The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission has accused Xtreme Fighting Championships and CEO Steven Smith of defrauding investors by selling millions of dollars of stock in the martial arts organization without disclosing the involvement of Smith or its criminally charged general counsel, according to a Florida federal lawsuit.
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December 10, 2024
Crypto Groups Rally Against Reappointing SEC's Crenshaw
Cryptocurrency industry groups are pushing back on a potential second term for U.S. Securities and Exchange Commissioner Caroline Crenshaw with an online ad campaign and letters to lawmakers ahead of a Senate Banking Committee vote Wednesday on the Democrat's confirmation.
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December 10, 2024
Soft Landing For Pilot As Billionaire's Insider Case Wraps
A pilot who admitted to dodging taxes on $500,000 in income after he was accused of taking stock tips from Joe Lewis, his billionaire boss, avoided prison on Tuesday at a sentencing that closed a high-profile insider trading prosecution.
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December 09, 2024
Trump Media Investors Urge Stay Denial In Del. Suit
Investors in Donald Trump's social media website urged a Delaware Chancery Court to deny a temporary stay brought by the president-elect in order to let Florida litigation play out first, saying presidential immunity doesn't extend to unofficial acts, and the lawsuit can proceed against Trump's affiliates.
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December 09, 2024
Akin Gump 'Totally Messed Up' With Texts, Vaxart Judge Says
A California federal judge asked by Vaxart investors to impose sanctions over a hedge fund's deleted text messages in a case claiming Vaxart inflated its stock price with deceptive headlines about a COVID-19 vaccine said Monday that the fund's lawyers at Akin Gump "totally, totally messed up."
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December 09, 2024
Blockchain Co. IP Fight With Investment Firm Teed Up For Trial
A California federal judge has said a jury should decide whether the investment firm Franklin Templeton misappropriated trade secrets of Blockchain Innovation LLC and breached its fiduciary duty and contract with the firm when it shut down a digital asset startup that Blockchain later acquired.
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December 09, 2024
Morgan Stanley Pays SEC $15M Over Theft By Ex-Reps
The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission announced a $15 million penalty against a Morgan Stanley subsidiary Monday, saying the company failed to put in place procedures that may have earlier caught four former employees who spent years stealing from clients.
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December 09, 2024
Satellite Co. Sued In Del. For Docs After $450M Merger
Two stockholders of satellite venture Terran Orbital Corp. sued the business in Delaware's Court of Chancery Friday for access to company records, linking the demand to their investigation of events leading up to the company's $450 million, 25-cents-per-share sale to Lockheed Martin in October.
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December 09, 2024
Feds Says Colo. Man's Investing Scheme Fleeced Pro Athletes
The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission on Monday filed a civil lawsuit accusing a Colorado man of swindling investors, including unidentified professional athletes, out of more than a million dollars.
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December 09, 2024
MIT Grads Say $25M Crypto Fraud Charges Not Rooted In Law
The two Massachusetts Institute of Technology-educated brothers accused of a $25 million crypto heist have told a New York federal judge that the indictment against them is "far removed from the heartland of wire fraud" since their novel trades can't be considered misrepresentations and that they had no notice their activity would be considered unlawful.
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December 09, 2024
SocGen Unit To Pay FINRA $950K Over Fingerprinting Lapses
A U.S.-based unit of French financial services company Societe Generale will pay a $950,000 fine to the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority to settle the self-regulatory organization's claims that the firm failed to fingerprint roughly 2,000 current and former employees at certain affiliates as required by law.
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December 09, 2024
Facebook Execs Deny Email Breach Harm In Del. Hearing
Two former Facebook directors turned to "chutzpah" in answering a stockholder class call for sanctions against them for deleting uncounted emails regarding privacy violations and the Cambridge Analytica scandal, a stockholder attorney told a Delaware vice chancellor on Monday.
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December 09, 2024
EV Carmaker Lucid Wants To Shed More Of Inflated Biz Suit
Electric carmaker Lucid Group has asked a California federal judge to toss most of the latest version of a proposed investor class action alleging its production forecasts were misleading, arguing that parts of the suit that remained intact after a recent dismissal order involved statements taken out of context.
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December 09, 2024
SEC's Trading And Markets Director Zhu To Leave Agency
Haoxiang Zhu is stepping down as head of the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission's Division of Trading and Markets, the agency announced Monday, leaving the group that oversees orderliness of U.S. markets as leadership continues to change at regulatory bodies following President-elect Donald Trump's election victory.
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December 09, 2024
Feds Seek 2-Year Sentence In Landmark Crypto Tax Case
The first person ever criminally charged for failing to report gains from the sale of cryptocurrency by filing false returns should be sentenced to more than two years in prison after he admitted underreporting $4 million in bitcoin proceeds, prosecutors told a Texas federal court.
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December 06, 2024
SEC Says Market Forecaster Ran Biotech Pump-And-Dump
The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission has sued a subscription-based investment advice company and its owner, accusing them of making nearly $1.4 million in a pump-and-dump scheme involving a purported drugmaker.
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December 06, 2024
Allianz Exec Avoids Prison For $7B Investor Fraud
A New York federal judge on Friday declined to sentence a former portfolio manager for Allianz SE's U.S. unit to any time in prison for lying to investors about the riskiness of a group of private investment funds that lost over $7 billion when the COVID-19 pandemic hit.
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December 06, 2024
Life Insurance Investments Aren't Securities, 9th Circ. Told
Agents who sold interests in life insurance policies for Pacific West Capital Group — which struck a $64 million SEC deal to end investment fraud claims — urged the Ninth Circuit on Friday to reverse an order requiring them to pay back some of their commissions, saying the deals weren't investment contracts.
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December 06, 2024
How Paul Atkins' Last SEC Term Might Shape Agency's Future
President-elect Donald Trump's choice to lead the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission next year is no stranger to the agency, and Paul Atkins' past speeches, statements and actions as a commissioner may offer a road map for how he would lead the agency in areas such as private funds, shareholder activism and multibillion-dollar enforcement sweeps.
Expert Analysis
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How D&O Coverage Can Aid Against Increased AI Scrutiny
The recent increase in regulatory enforcement and securities class actions stemming from corporate use of artificial intelligence should prompt companies to ensure that their directors and officers liability insurance coverage is appropriately tailored to AI-related risks, say attorneys at Reed Smith.
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Crypto Cos. Add New Play In Their Offense Against SEC
Consensys and Crypto.com have adopted a novel strategy of preempting U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission enforcement actions by moving to crypto-friendly Texas and filing declaratory lawsuits challenging the SEC's jurisdiction to regulate crypto-assets — an aggressive approach that may pay off, say attorneys at Herrick Feinstein.
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3 Ways To Train Junior Lawyers In 30 Minutes Or Less
Today’s junior lawyers are experiencing a skills gap due to pandemic-era disruptions, but firms can help bring them up to speed by offering high-impact skill building content in bite-sized, interactive training sessions, say Stacey Schwartz at Katten, Diane Costigan at Winston & Strawn and Lauren Tierney at Freshfields.
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How To Safely Leverage AI In The Digital Assets Industry
Digital asset businesses that use or plan to implement artificial intelligence should assess their risk management frameworks to ensure that AI-related business areas, including customer support and fraud detection, are in compliance with applicable laws and regulatory guidance from the last year, say attorneys at Winston & Strawn.
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$3B TD Bank AML Settlement Is A Wake-Up Call For All Banks
TD Bank’s historic settlement over anti-money laundering violations, resulting in over $3 billion in penalties, reminds banks of all shapes and sizes why they need to take financial crime compliance seriously, and highlights three areas that may be especially vulnerable to enforcement, says Jack Harrington at Bradley Arant.
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What Trump Presidency May Mean For Climate Reporting
While the Trump administration will likely take a hands-off approach to climate-related disclosures and rescind regulations promulgated under the Biden administration, state and international ESG laws mean the private sector may not reverse course on such disclosures, say attorneys at Seyfarth.
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SEC Action Indicates Continued Focus On ESG Disclosures
The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission's recently settled enforcement action against Invesco Advisers provides a road map for how regulatory agencies will continue to focus on ESG-related disclosures going forward, and underscores a focus on greenwashing, say attorneys at V&E.
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The Bar Needs More Clarity On The Discovery Objection Rule
Almost 10 years after Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 34 was amended, attorneys still seem confused about what they should include in objections to discovery requests, and until the rules committee provides additional clarity, practitioners must beware the steep costs of noncompliance, says Tristan Ellis at Shanies Law Office.
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The AI Consumer Class Action Threat Is Not A Hallucination
As regulators scrutinize whether businesses can deliver on claims about their artificial intelligence products and services, the industry faces a wave of consumer fraud class actions — but AI companies can protect themselves by prioritizing fundamental best practices that are often overlooked, say Ronald Levine at Herrick Feinstein and Richard Torrenzano at the Torrenzano Group.
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What's Next For The CFTC After The Election
While much of the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission's enforcement actions in line with its traditional priorities will continue as usual in the near term, postelection leadership changes at the CFTC and new congressional priorities may alter the commission's regulatory framework in 2025 and beyond — particularly its oversight of crypto, say attorneys at WilmerHale.
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Del. Dispatch: Clarifying Charter Amendment Vote Obligations
The Delaware Court of Chancery recently held in Gunderson v. The Trade Desk that only a majority stockholder vote is needed to approve a company's proposed reincorporation from Delaware to Nevada through a corporate conversion, which bodes well for other companies also considering leaving the First State, say attorneys at Fried Frank.
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What's Still Up In The Air After Ruling On Calif. Climate Laws
A California federal court's recent ruling on challenges to California's sweeping climate disclosure laws resolved some issues, but allows litigation over the constitutionality of the laws to continue, and leaves many important questions on what entities will need to do to comply with the laws unanswered, say attorneys at Paul Hastings.
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Series
Being A Navy Reservist Makes Me A Better Lawyer
Serving this country in uniform has not only been one of the greatest honors of my life, but it has also provided me with opportunities to broaden my legal acumen and interpersonal skills in ways that have indelibly contributed to my civilian practice, says Phillip Smith at Weinberg Wheeler.
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Navigating DOJ's Patchwork Whistleblower Regime
In the past few months, the U.S. Department of Justice and several individual U.S. attorney’s offices have issued different pilot programs aimed at incentivizing individuals to blow the whistle on misconduct, but this piecemeal approach may create confusion and suboptimal outcomes, say attorneys at BakerHostetler.
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So You Want To Move Your Law Practice To Canada, Eh?
Google searches for how to move to Canada have surged in the wake of the U.S. presidential election, and if you’re an attorney considering a move to the Great White North, you’ll need to understand how the practice of law differs across the border, says David Postel at Henein Hutchison.