10 For 10: Top Compliance Stories For the Week Ending March 15, 2025
Ep. 3 - The Art of Parallel Investigations (Part 2)
Episode 286 -- Matt Stankiewicz on the Ripple Decision and Celsius CEO Indictment
Blue Sky Laws: Defending State-Level Securities Violations
The Justice Insiders: The Administrative State is Not Your Friend - A Conversation with Professor Richard Epstein
Four Decision Points in SEC Securities Investigations
Crypto Enforcement Is Here, and Always Has Been
Cryptocurrency: The Regulator’s Perspective
Investment Management Roundtable Discussion – Regulatory and Enforcement Update
On April 1, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the First Circuit vacated a summary judgment ruling in favor of the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) against Commonwealth Equity Services, LLC, also known as Commonwealth...more
The number of accounting-related securities class action filings and settlements remained steady in 2024, with the number of filings increasing slightly and for the third consecutive year, according to a new report from...more
Welcome to the Q1 2025 edition of A&O Shearman’s Fifth Circuit Securities Litigation Quarterly. As public companies and financial institutions continue to migrate to Texas, our Texas-based securities litigation team continues...more
Disciplinary notices issued by the CME Group’s Market Regulation Enforcement team remained steady in 2024 after experiencing a significant increase in 2023, according to a new report by Cornerstone Research. The report,...more
The court rejects the SEC's per se materiality argument and requires proof of a causal connection between the defendant's allegedly inadequate disclosures and purported unlawful profits....more
The Federal Court of Australia has imposed a $10.5m (AUD) penalty on an Australian superannuation fund, in the latest of the Australian Securities and Investments Commission's greenwashing cases to reach the penalty hearing...more
The number of securities class action settlements increased slightly in 2024 while the size of those settlements declined, according to a new report from Cornerstone Research. The report, Securities Class Action...more
Securities class action case filings remained flat in 2024, with 229 filings equaling the number of new cases filed in 2023. The number of filings in 2024 tied with 2023 for the highest number of filings since 2020. The...more
The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) drastically reduced its accounting and auditing enforcement activity in fiscal year 2024, the final year of Gary Gensler’s administration, ending two consecutive years of...more
StraightPath Venture Partners, LLC and PMAC Consulting have recently reached settlements with the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) following SEC enforcement actions against them....more
As is the case with much of the blockchain industry, decentralized autonomous organizations (DAOs) are unique. The existence of a DAO does not necessarily imply the existence of a legal entity or an intent to share profits....more
On January 17, 2025, a few days before the presidential inauguration, the SEC reported a record-breaking first quarter of fiscal year 2025 (October through December 2024) with 200 total enforcement actions, including 118...more
On February 21, 2025, Commissioner Hester Peirce released a statement inviting input from interested parties on the regulation of crypto assets. Commissioner Peirce stated that greater crypto clarity requires the public’s...more
A recent lawsuit filed in the US District Court for the Southern District of New York—Sarria v. Telus International (Cda) Inc. et al., No. 1:25-cv-00889 (S.D.N.Y. Jan 30, 2025)—involves two distinct risks associated with...more
As we head further into 2025, the landscape of SEC exams and enforcement is poised for significant shifts. How will the SEC adapt to emerging trends and evolving market dynamics? In the first issue of Beyond the Deal in 2025,...more
How did federal racketeering and conspiracy charges against a politician and a 501(c)(4) organization controlled by him lead to another company’s alleged securities law violations? According to this SEC Order against...more
On January 14, 2025, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) charged Presto Automation Inc. (Presto) with violations of the Securities Act of 1933 and the Securities Exchange Act of 1934 for misleading artificial...more
On January 27, FINRA accepted a Letter of Acceptance, Waiver, and Consent (AWC) addressing alleged violations committed by the respondent, retail market maker offering execution services to broker-dealers and member firm...more
The US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) brought a number of notable enforcement proceedings against public companies in fiscal year 2024, which ended September 30, 2024, and into the first quarter of fiscal year 2025....more
On January 14, 2025, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (the “SEC”) sued Elon Musk over his 2022 acquisition of Twitter, Inc. stock and alleged failure to timely disclose a 5% ownership stake in Twitter, as required...more
A recent Securities and Exchange Commission (“SEC”) settlement with DMK Pharmaceuticals Corporation (“DMK Pharmaceuticals”) and its Chief Financial Officer (“CFO”) serves as a good reminder that SEC-regulated entities...more
Section 47(b) of the Investment Company Act of 1940 provides that contracts that violate or “whose performance involves, a violation of” the act are not enforceable by “either party.” ...more
Enforcement during Gensler administration was considerably higher than during the previous administration. The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) brought 33 cryptocurrency-related enforcement actions in 2024, the...more
On 14 January 2025, the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) announced settled charges against three investment adviser representatives for acting as unregistered brokers in the sale of membership interests in certain...more
On Tuesday, the SEC filed a complaint in the D.C. federal district court alleging that Elon Musk ignored the Section 13(d) beneficial ownership reporting deadline when, in March 2022, he acquired more than 5% of outstanding...more