The Securities and Exchange Commission brought charges against Xue Samuel Lee, the co-founder of HyperFund, and Brenda Indah Chunga, also known as “Bitcoin Beautee,” the fund’s top promoter, for securities violations. ...more
Last year, the Court in SEC v. Terraform Labs suggested, by denying the defendants’ motion to dismiss, that the sale of a digital asset to the public on a secondary market may constitute a security. Now, the Court has...more
Recently, the Securities and Exchange Commission brought fraud charges against Jonathan Larmore for allegedly looting $35 million from real estate funds he advised. Larmore is a real estate investor, an investment adviser,...more
On Tuesday, August 29, 2023, Bitcoin once again loomed large over financial markets after the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals vacated an SEC order that rejected Grayscale Investments’ (“Grayscale”) application to list a spot...more
The issue of whether the sales of digital assets constitute investment contracts (and therefore securities) remains at the forefront of SEC regulatory issues. Yesterday, in SEC v. Terraform Labs, a federal judge in New York...more
In a recent and highly anticipated decision, a court in the Southern District of New York held that Ripple’s cryptocurrency token – XRP – is not inherently a security. In a setback to the SEC, the court also held that...more
7/31/2023
/ Coinbase ,
Cryptocurrency ,
Digital Assets ,
Enforcement ,
Howey ,
Investment ,
Investors ,
Popular ,
Ripple ,
Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) ,
Summary Judgment ,
Token Sales ,
Unregistered Securities
Last week, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission brought five insider-trading cases against a slew of individuals. The U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York also announced parallel criminal...more
On January 10, 2023, the SEC filed a subpoena enforcement action against Covington, a large law firm that was victimized by the so-called Hafnium cyberattack by Chinese state actors. Hafnium reportedly was engaged in...more
Recent Enforcement Action -
The requirement that financial firms preserve books and records is nothing new. But how do such firms keep track of employees’ communications on applications like Signal or WhatsApp? Those...more
Corporate officers and directors sometimes view having a Rule 10b5-1 trading plan as an impenetrable barrier to facing insider-trading charges. But a recent case announced by the SEC demonstrates that such plans are not...more
Recently, in SEC v. Spartan Securities Group, Ltd, et al., a Florida federal court held that the Securities and Exchange Commission (“SEC”) could seek disgorgement and direct funds to the Treasury because the defrauded...more
On May 3, the SEC announced that the Cyber Unit in the Division of Enforcement is renamed the “Crypto Assets and Cyber Unit” and will expand by 20 positions to approximately 50 positions. Regulation of digital assets has...more
5/5/2022
/ CFTC ,
Commodity Exchange Act (CEA) ,
Cryptoassets ,
Cryptocurrency ,
Decentralized Finance (DeFi) ,
Enforcement ,
Fraud ,
Lending ,
Non-Fungible Tokens (NFTs) ,
Ponzi Scheme ,
Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) ,
Stablecoins
On April 5, the Public Company Accounting Oversight Board levied a $100,000 fine against Scott Marcello, the former Vice Chair of Audit at KPMG. The penalty is noteworthy for two reasons: (1) it’s the largest monetary...more
On March 16, the SEC filed a municipal bond fraud case against Crosby Independent School District and its former CFO in a $20 million bond offering. Crosby is a suburb of Houston, Texas. The SEC also charged the district’s...more
There has been lots of breathless commentary in the financial press and the blogosphere over the SEC’s August 2021 filing of an insider-trading case involving so-called “shadow trading.” Shadow trading as defined in a 2020...more
It’s not a secret that, under the Biden administration, the Securities and Exchange Commission has prioritized enforcement of disclosures concerning Environmental, Social, and Governance Issues (ESG), going so far as to form...more
On December 20, 2021, the SEC and DOJ each announced fraud charges against five Russian nationals. The five defendants are charged with a multiyear scheme of hacking into service providers that help public companies make...more
The United States Securities and Exchange Commission recently charged two individuals— Florida residents, Suyun Gu, and his friend, Yong Lee—for their involvement in allegedly fraudulent wash sales involving out-of-the-money...more
10/7/2021
/ Broker-Dealer ,
Civil Monetary Penalty ,
Disgorgement ,
Fraud ,
New Jersey ,
Permanent Injunctions ,
Securities Act ,
Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) ,
Securities Exchange Act ,
Traders ,
Wash Sale Rules
Today the SEC and the DOJ announced civil and criminal charges involving an alleged brazen $8 million insider-trading scheme. The trader, Dayakar Mallu, allegedly traded ahead of four public announcements by his former...more
On July 13, the SEC announced charges against an array of participants in a de-SPAC transaction. Among those charged are the SPAC, the SPAC’s sponsor, the SPAC’s CEO, the merger target, and the merger target’s CEO.
The...more
Reuters reported today that the SEC is investigating last year’s hack of SolarWinds, focusing on whether SEC registrants failed to disclose that they had been impacted by the cyber breach. According to the article, the SEC...more
“Naked short selling” is often claimed by struggling public companies to be the source of their woes. But there have been relatively few cases addressing naked short selling. Recently, however, on May 19, 2021, the SEC...more
5/27/2021
/ Broker-Dealer ,
Disgorgement ,
Injunctions ,
Investment Adviser ,
Penalties ,
Publicly-Traded Companies ,
Regulation SHO ,
Section 203 ,
Securities ,
Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) ,
Securities Litigation ,
Short Selling
On April 1, 2021, the Texas State Securities Board (TSSB) announced the entry of a Consent Order against an SEC registered investment adviser named Independent Financial Group, LLC (“Independent”). The TSSB’s action may...more
Capital raising through Special-Purpose Acquisition Companies (“SPACs”) has gone through the roof in the last two years. Last year was by far the single highest deal value for SPACs, and the first quarter of 2021 has already...more
As we discussed in our recent post “What to Expect from the SEC Under the Biden Administration,” market participants can expect a more vigorous SEC enforcement program under the new administration. President Biden’s nominee...more
3/11/2021
/ Asset Valuations ,
Biden Administration ,
Conflicts of Interest ,
Disclosure Requirements ,
Enforcement Actions ,
Environmental Social & Governance (ESG) ,
Fees ,
Fund Managers ,
General Solicitation ,
Investment Adviser ,
Personal Information ,
Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) ,
Transparency