On January 13, 2025, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission announced settled enforcement actions with five registered investment advisers for failing to maintain and preserve internal electronic communications. These...more
1/20/2025
/ Administrative Procedure Act ,
Cease and Desist Orders ,
Compliance ,
Electronic Communications ,
Enforcement Actions ,
Financial Services Industry ,
Investment Advisers Act of 1940 ,
Penalties ,
Recordkeeping Requirements ,
Remedial Actions ,
Rulemaking Process ,
Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) ,
Securities Exchange Act ,
Securities Regulation ,
Settlement ,
WhatsApp
On December 5, 2024, the Staff of every market-facing division of the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) issued a joint “Staff Advisory” on the use of artificial intelligence in CFTC-regulated markets and...more
On December 3, 2024, the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Texas issued a preliminary injunction regarding enforcement of the Corporate Transparency Act (CTA) and related beneficial ownership reporting rule. The...more
12/6/2024
/ Corporate Transparency Act ,
Department of Justice (DOJ) ,
Enforcement ,
Financial Crimes ,
FinCEN ,
First Amendment ,
Fourth Amendment ,
Preliminary Injunctions ,
Reporting Requirements ,
Texas ,
Unconstitutional Condition
During the course of any lending transaction, lenders will conduct a due diligence review of the borrower, including reviewing any relevant “know-your-customer” information. In the context of a fund finance transaction, this...more
10/10/2024
/ Borrowers ,
California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA) ,
Cybersecurity ,
Data Privacy ,
Data Protection ,
Due Diligence ,
EU ,
Financial Institutions ,
Firewalls ,
General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) ,
Investors ,
Lenders ,
Multi-Factor Authentication ,
SaaS
On September 12, 2024, the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) finalized the first major changes to CFTC Regulation 4.7 (Rule 4.7) in over 30 years. Among other technical revisions, the amendments to Rule 4.7,...more
A global technology outage linked to the cybersecurity firm CrowdStrike crashed Microsoft apps and triggered major disruptions across the asset management sector, along with other global industries. Private fund managers...more
Last week, the Securities and Exchange Commission imposed expanded privacy and cybersecurity obligations on fund managers and sponsors registered with the SEC as investment advisers. While many registered investment advisers...more
5/21/2024
/ Breach Notification Rule ,
Customer Information ,
Cybersecurity ,
Fund Managers ,
Incident Response Plans ,
Investment Adviser ,
Notice Requirements ,
Policies and Procedures ,
Privacy Laws ,
Private Funds ,
Recordkeeping Requirements ,
Regulation S-P ,
Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) ,
Sponsors
In February 2024, the U.S. Department of the Treasury issued its 2024 Investment Adviser Risk Assessment, which explains that there are “several illicit finance threats involving investment advisers,” including that...more
5/17/2024
/ AML/CFT ,
Customer Identification Program (CIP) ,
Exempt Reporting Advisers (ERAs) ,
FinCEN ,
Investment Adviser ,
Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (NOPR) ,
Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) ,
Popular ,
Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) ,
Suspicious Activity Reports (SARs) ,
U.S. Treasury ,
Venture Capital
On April 12, 2024, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission imposed fines and other sanctions on five registered investment advisers (RIAs) for violations of the Investment Adviser Marketing Rule (Rule 206(4)-1), which has...more
On Friday, April 5, 2024, a San Francisco jury found the defendant liable in SEC v. Panuwat, the closely watched litigated enforcement action brought by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) relating to so-called...more
On April 3, 2024, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) announced its first enforcement action against a registered investment adviser (RIA) with no ties to a broker-dealer regarding so-called “off-channel”...more
4/10/2024
/ Broker-Dealer ,
Electronic Communications ,
Enforcement Actions ,
Fund Managers ,
Investigations ,
Investment Adviser ,
Investment Management ,
Recordkeeping Requirements ,
Registered Investment Advisors ,
Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) ,
Securities Regulation ,
Securities Violations
Key Points - In a thorough decision, a federal district judge in New York largely denied Coinbase’s motion for judgment on the pleadings in a case brought by the SEC. Applying the plaintiff-friendly standards required at the...more
Fundraising’s Effect on Dealmaking - Fundraising has been challenging over the past 12 months, primarily driven by the fact that distributions have slowed as a result of the lack of exit opportunities....more
The year 2023 will be remembered as a challenging one for private equity (PE), with complexities to navigate on many fronts. Traditional debt financing was expensive and scarce, expectations on valuations were tricky to...more
3/12/2024
/ Antitrust Provisions ,
Carbon Capture and Sequestration ,
CFIUS ,
China ,
Corporate Transparency Act ,
Divestiture ,
Domestic Dealmaking ,
Drug Pricing ,
Energy Sector ,
Foreign Direct Investment ,
Foreign Investment ,
Greenhouse Gas Emissions ,
Healthcare ,
Investment ,
Life Sciences ,
Liquidity ,
Mergers ,
Non-Compete Agreements ,
Prescription Drugs ,
Private Equity ,
Private Equity Firms ,
Renewable Energy ,
Reporting Requirements ,
UK ,
Unions ,
Venture Capital
A U.S. District Court judge in Alabama recently ruled that the Corporate Transparency Act (“CTA”) is unconstitutional. The CTA, which was enacted on January 1, 2021, directs the U.S. Department of the Treasury’s Financial...more
On February 20, 2024, the U.S. Supreme Court declined to hear an appeal brought by the trustee of the Millennium Lender Claim Trust challenging the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 2nd Circuit’s August 2023 decision, in which...more
Key Points - On February 13, 2024, FinCEN issued an NPRM that seeks to include certain investment advisers in the definition of “financial institution” under the BSA. As described in the NPRM as well as in FinCEN’s fact...more
2/16/2024
/ AML/CFT ,
Anti-Money Laundering ,
Bank Secrecy Act ,
Chief Compliance Officers ,
Due Diligence ,
Exempt Reporting Advisers (ERAs) ,
Financial Institutions ,
FinCEN ,
Investment Adviser ,
Investors ,
Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (NOPR) ,
Policies and Procedures ,
Proposed Rules ,
Recordkeeping Requirements ,
Risk Assessment ,
Suspicious Activity Reports (SARs)
Key Points - Last week, the SEC announced settlements with 16 broker-dealers, dually registered broker-dealers and investment advisers, and affiliated investment advisers in connection with their failures to maintain and...more
Earlier today, the Securities and Exchange Commission in a 3‑2 vote adopted new Rules 3a5‑4 and 3a44‑2 (together, the Dealer Rules) under the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, as amended (the Exchange Act), that will define...more
In the weeks since publishing our original alert, FinCEN released several frequently asked questions (FAQs) on the application of the Corporate Transparency Act (CTA). Private fund managers are likely to find two of these...more
2/1/2024
/ Beneficial Owner ,
Commodity Pool ,
Corporate Transparency Act ,
Exemptions ,
FinCEN ,
Foreign Corporations ,
Fund Managers ,
Investment Adviser ,
Investment Advisers Act of 1940 ,
Limited Liability Company (LLC) ,
New York ,
Popular ,
Private Funds ,
Reporting Requirements ,
Subsidiaries ,
Transparency
In the two weeks since the Corporate Transparency Act (CTA) went into effect (see our alert here), the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN) has published several Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs) clarifying the new...more
1/17/2024
/ Beneficial Owner ,
Beneficiaries ,
Corporate Entities ,
Corporate Transparency Act ,
Exemptions ,
FinCEN ,
Grantors ,
Intermediaries ,
Joint Ownership ,
New Guidance ,
Reporting Requirements ,
Smaller Reporting Companies ,
Subsidiaries ,
Tax Exempt Entities ,
Trustees
Key Points - In SEC v. Terraform, the court has granted summary judgment for the SEC on its claim that the defendants offered and sold unregistered securities in the form of “crypto assets.” This comes amidst the SEC...more
1/15/2024
/ Bitcoin ,
Cryptoassets ,
Cryptocurrency ,
Department of Justice (DOJ) ,
Howey ,
Ripple ,
Securities Act of 1933 ,
Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) ,
Securities Tokens ,
Security-Based Swaps ,
Stablecoins ,
Summary Judgment
While it took a few decades to surface, the fact pattern set forth in the movie “Trading Places” has finally come to pass. However, instead of the alleged wrongdoers bribing a U.S. government official for a sneak peek at...more
Starting on January 1, 2024, entities that are organized in the United States or are registered to do business in the United States will generally be required to disclose to the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (an...more
12/11/2023
/ Beneficial Owner ,
CFTC ,
Commodity Trading Advisors (CTAs) ,
Corporate Transparency Act ,
FinCEN ,
Foreign Entities ,
Fund Managers ,
Investment Management ,
Private Funds ,
Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) ,
Venture Capital
Key Points -
The Corporate Transparency Act (the “CTA”), implemented primarily through a rule published by FinCEN on September 30, 2022, the Beneficial Ownership Information Reporting Rule (“BOIR Rule”), becomes effective...more