The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) recently announced its enforcement results for fiscal year 2023, which reported a total of 784 enforcement actions, up 3% from FY22. This includes 501 original (stand-alone)...more
Recent Securities and Exchange Commission enforcement actions have zeroed in on whistleblower protections in employee separation agreements, signaling that now may be the time for companies to closely review employee...more
On July 13, 2023, US District Judge Analisa Torres of the US District Court for the Southern District of New York ruled that Ripple Labs’ token, XRP, was a security when sold to institutional investors and not a security when...more
At the March 2023 American Bar Association National Institute on White Collar Crime, senior Department of Justice officials offered their most expansive guidance yet about the dangers of using ephemeral messaging for company...more
In Securities and Exchange Commission v. LBRY, Inc., a federal court in New Hampshire found that under the Howey test, digital tokens sold by LBRY were securities, and that LBRY’s offer and sale of those unregistered...more
On March 9, 2022, the Securities and Exchange Commission (“SEC”) proposed new rules which, if adopted, would require public companies to promptly disclose material cybersecurity incidents and, more generally, to provide more...more
What you need to know Since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, the number of whistleblower complaints received by regulators has exploded on both sides of the Atlantic. On November 15, 2021, the US Securities and Exchange...more
Gurbir Grewal, the recently-appointed Director of the Securities and Exchange Commission’s Division of Enforcement, comes from a law enforcement background. Before joining the SEC, he served as New Jersey Attorney General,...more
What happened -
Last week the SEC brought securities fraud charges against App Annie and its co-founder and former CEO and Chairman Bertrand Schmitt for engaging in deceptive practices and making material...more
Securities and Exchange Commission Chairman Gary Gensler has pledged to bring a renewed focus to robust enforcement of the federal securities laws. As we observed in a recent blog post, under Chairman Gensler and Director...more
Gary Gensler was sworn in as chair of the Securities and Exchange Commission on April 17, 2021. Chairman Gensler has promised to strengthen transparency and accountability in the financial markets. Under Chairman Gensler, we...more
7/29/2021
/ 10b5-1 Plans ,
Civil Monetary Penalty ,
Cybersecurity ,
Disclosure Requirements ,
Enforcement Actions ,
Environmental Social & Governance (ESG) ,
Gary Gensler ,
Initial Public Offering (IPO) ,
Insider Trading ,
Investors ,
Popular ,
Private Investment in Public Equity (PIPEs) ,
Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) ,
Shareholders ,
Special Purpose Acquisition Companies (SPACs) ,
Whistleblowers
What happened -
In a recent client alert, we discussed the dramatic rise in offerings of special purpose acquisition companies (SPACs) and some of the attendant litigation and enforcement risks. A raft of recent public...more
What happened The SEC recently brought charges against AT&T and three mid-level executives for selectively providing information to Wall Street analysts in alleged violation of Regulation Fair Disclosure (Reg FD). According...more
What is a SPAC -
Special purpose acquisition companies (SPACs) are on the rise. A SPAC is a publicly traded shell company with no underlying operating business that seeks to merge with a target operating company. According...more
What happened President Joe Biden announced that he would nominate Gary Gensler to serve as the next chairman of the US Securities and Exchange Commission. Gensler formerly served as head of the Commodity Futures Trading...more
On March 24, 2020, Judge P. Kevin Castel of the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York granted the Securities and Exchange Commission’s (SEC) request for a preliminary injunction against Telegram Group Inc....more
A way out of the ‘regulatory Catch-22’ for launching distributed networks?
In a February 6 speech at the International Blockchain Congress in Chicago, Securities and Exchange Commission Commissioner Hester Peirce...more
On April 3, the SEC Division of Corporation Finance released a No Action Letter and a suggested framework for applying the investment contract analysis to tokens and digital assets....more
On March 27, 2018, Massachusetts' top securities regulator – the Massachusetts Securities Division (the Division) – propelled itself to the forefront of the ongoing debate about whether "initial coin offerings" (ICOs) should...more
In February, the SEC announced that it had adopted long-awaited new guidance on cybersecurity disclosure. While the new guidance builds on Corp Fin's 2011 guidance on this topic, it carries more weight because it bears the...more