Securities

  • September 06, 2024

    CFTC Loses Court Battle Over Election Betting Contracts

    A Washington, D.C., federal judge ruled against the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission on Friday in a case that challenged an agency ban on the use of the derivatives markets to place bets on the outcome of U.S. elections, granting victory to trading platform KalshiEx LLC. 

  • September 06, 2024

    Boeing Loses Bid To Toss Investor Suit Over Blowout

    A Virginia federal judge gave the green light to Boeing investors to continue their securities fraud proposed class suit against the company over one of its planes' midair door blowout in January, rejecting the aerospace giant's motion to dismiss and telling Boeing it had a "real problem" on its hands.

  • September 06, 2024

    Three Defendants Settle SEC's $14M Pot Co. Securities Suit

    The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission has reached settlements with three defendants who allegedly misappropriated $14 million in investment funds intended for a cannabis enterprise, with the three agreeing to pay back a total of more than $4 million in disgorgements and interest and $3 million in civil penalties.

  • September 06, 2024

    SEC Accuses Fla. Men Of Mass Tort Litigation Financing Fraud

    The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission on Friday accused a father and son from Florida of running a fraudulent litigation funding scheme by promising investors returns from financing mass tort litigation they were not actually funding.

  • September 06, 2024

    Morgan Stanley Fined $2M Over First Republic Exec's Trades

    Massachusetts' top securities cop on Friday imposed a fine of $2 million on Morgan Stanley for failing to ensure that a New Republic Bank chairman hadn't relied on insider information when he dumped millions of dollars of the bank's stock in the days and months before its collapse.

  • September 06, 2024

    Baker McKenzie M&A Partner Jumps To Bell Nunnally

    Dallas-based business law firm Bell Nunnally & Martin LLP has hired former Baker McKenzie partner Jonathan Farrokhnia, who told Law360 on Friday that his decision to join the firm was based on the advantages that come from working for a smaller firm.

  • September 06, 2024

    SEC Accuses Esmark Of Lying About US Steel Bid

    A failed bid to acquire U.S. Steel has landed Pittsburgh-based Esmark Inc. in hot water with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, which announced Friday that it had fined the company and its founder for falsely claiming they had the money to buy the manufacturing giant.

  • September 05, 2024

    Coinbase, Execs Must Face Investor Suit Over Business Risks

    A New Jersey federal judge on Thursday declined to dismiss a consolidated investor class action against Coinbase and its executives over disclosures the cryptocurrency exchange made about certain business risks it faced, although he trimmed certain allegations deemed to be, among other things, corporate puffery.

  • September 05, 2024

    TikToker Conned Followers With Real Estate Fraud, Feds Say

    A social media influencer faces criminal charges and a suit from the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission after he allegedly made false claims to investors that money put into purported real estate projects would earn them passive income.

  • September 05, 2024

    GitLab's AI Hype Was Too Optimistic, Investor Suit Says

    Software development collaboration platform GitLab is the latest company to face claims that it misguided investors about how artificial intelligence might bolster its fortunes as it faced other headwinds, including mounting costs for a China-based joint venture, that caused its share price to sink.

  • September 05, 2024

    CFTC Says Ex-Commish's Signature Was Forged For $1.5M Scam

    The Commodity Futures Trading Commission has sued the operator of an unlicensed commodity pool for allegedly targeting dozens of Spanish-speaking immigrants in a $1.5 million Ponzi-like scheme that used a fictitious license containing a counterfeit CFTC seal and a forged commissioner signature to falsely promise investors guaranteed monthly returns.

  • September 05, 2024

    Class Attys Vie To Lead Drug Co. Insider Trading Suit In Del.

    A courtroom face-off over lead stockholder counsel duties in a Delaware Chancery Court case accusing a biopharmaceutical company's directors of insider trading and fiduciary duty breaches got edgy Thursday, after one of the plaintiff-side legal teams contended that the other's case was irreparably hobbled by conflicts of interest.

  • September 05, 2024

    Ex-SEC Enforcement Atty Joins Whistleblower Law Boutique

    Kohn Kohn & Colapinto announced Thursday that a former U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission enforcement attorney will join the whistleblower law firm as senior special counsel.

  • September 05, 2024

    Investment Firm Fights Order To Return Docs In NJ Bias Suit

    A Black-owned investment firm accusing BlackRock Inc. and New Jersey of squeezing it out of a lucrative contract has challenged a U.S. magistrate judge's order to return redacted emails to the Garden State, arguing that the order was made without a full written record or a requested conference on the privilege dispute.

  • September 05, 2024

    Circor Dodges SEC Fine As Ex-Exec Faces Falsified Docs Suit

    The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission on Thursday said industrial valve manufacturer Circor International Inc. has avoided a penalty after it self-reported and remediated an alleged accounting scheme, while the agency sued a former executive accused of falsifying the financial results for one of the company's business units.

  • September 05, 2024

    Pharma Co. Verrica Fails To Shed Investor Suit Over FDA OK

    A Pennsylvania federal judge has partially denied Verrica Phamaceuticals Inc.'s second request to throw out a proposed class action filed by investors who claim the company defrauded them by hiding obstacles it faced in obtaining approval from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration for its lead product.

  • September 05, 2024

    Ga. Investment Adviser To Pay $335K To End SEC Suit

    Atlanta-based West Mountain LLC and its director, Paul Alar, will pay $335,000 and take other steps to resolve a U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission complaint alleging they fraudulently overvalued assets and collected inflated fees.

  • September 05, 2024

    CrowdStrike Brass Face Investor Suit Over Global Outage

    Executives and directors of global cybersecurity company CrowdStrike have been hit with a shareholder derivative suit alleging that they overstated the capabilities of the company's technology that eventually caused a massive disruption over the summer when its system crashed.

  • September 05, 2024

    7th Circ. Doubts JPMorgan Traders' Spoofing Appeal

    The Seventh Circuit seemed skeptical Thursday about three former JPMorgan traders' assertion that evidentiary issues surrounding their underlying spoofing trials warrant unwinding their convictions for manipulating the market with fake orders for precious metals.

  • September 05, 2024

    2nd Circ. Chilly To Mortgage-Backed Securities ERISA Suit

    The Second Circuit appeared unlikely Thursday to revive a union pension fund's suit looking to hold Wells Fargo and Ocwen Financial Corp. liable for losses on mortgage-backed securities, with two judges signaling the risky loans the fund sued over might not be covered by federal benefits law.

  • September 05, 2024

    Chancery Presses Pause On $450M Bolt Financial Financing

    Affiliates of multinational investors Hedosophia and BlackRock have won a Delaware Court of Chancery pause of a purported Bolt Financial Inc. $450 million equity financing that would eliminate and replace all the company's preferred stock while returning founder Ryan Breslow to his CEO seat.

  • September 05, 2024

    Cooley Hires Corporate Governance Pro As Strategic Adviser

    Cooley LLP has hired a thought leader with expertise in securities regulation as a strategic adviser to provide content for clients, including a new blog to give guidance on all types of governance issues, the firm announced Thursday.

  • September 04, 2024

    Robinhood Inks $3.9M Deal In Calif.'s Crypto Withdrawal Probe

    Robinhood's cryptocurrency trading platform will pay a $3.9 million penalty to resolve the state of California's claims that the Menlo Park-based company didn't allow customers to make withdrawals from their accounts from 2018 to 2022, California Attorney General Rob Bonta announced on Wednesday.

  • September 04, 2024

    SEC Lets Deadline Pass For 5th Circ. Private Funds Appeal

    The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission won't challenge a Fifth Circuit decision that vacated its recently passed disclosure rules for private fund advisers, taking no action as its deadline to appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court passed.

  • September 04, 2024

    FINRA Beats Post-Jarkesy Challenge To Enforcement Powers

    The Financial Industry Regulatory Authority has beaten back a broker's bid to use the U.S. Supreme Court's recent Jarkesy decision to challenge its enforcement regime, after a Pennsylvania federal judge found other high court precedent barred him from hearing the broker's constitutional challenge to the regulator's proceedings.

Expert Analysis

  • How Corner Post Affects Enviro Laws' Statutes Of Limitations

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    The U.S. Supreme Court's recent ruling in Corner Post v. Federal Reserve Board has helped to alter the fundamental underpinnings of administrative law — and its plaintiff-centric approach may have implications for some specific environmental laws' statutes of limitations, say Chris Leason and Liam Martin at Gallagher and Kennedy.

  • FTC Drives Crackdown On Connected Cars' Data Privacy Risk

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    After the Federal Trade Commission's warning to automakers about data privacy, which continues to emerge as a national concern, automakers must carefully examine their data collection, use and retention practices, say Catherine Castaldo and Michael Rubayo at Reed Smith.

  • Jarkesy May Thwart Consumer Agencies' Civil Penalty Power

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    The U.S. Supreme Court's ruling in U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission v. Jarkesy not only implicates future SEC administrative adjudications, but those of other agencies that operate similarly — and may stymie regulators' efforts to levy civil monetary penalties in a range of consumer protection enforcement actions, say attorneys at Holland & Knight.

  • Lessons From Recent SEC Cyber Enforcement Actions

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    The recent guidance by the SEC's Division of Corporation Finance is helpful to any company facing a cybersecurity threat, but just as instructive are the warnings raised by the SEC's recent enforcement actions against SolarWinds, R.R. Donnelley and Intercontinental Exchange, say attorneys at O'Melveny.

  • Opinion

    Texas Judges Ignored ERISA's Core To Stall Fiduciary Rule

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    Two recent rulings from Texas federal courts, which rely on a plainly wrong reading of the Employee Retirement Income Security Act to effectively strike a forthcoming rule that would impose functional fiduciary duties onto sellers of investment services, may expose financially unsophisticated 401(k) participants to peddlers of misleading advice, says Mark DeBofsky at DeBofsky Law.

  • 2nd Circ. Ruling Reaffirms Short-Swing Claims Have Standing

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    The Second Circuit's recent ruling in Packer v. Raging Capital reversing the dismissal of a shareholder's Section 16(b) derivative suit seeking to recover short-swing profits for lack of constitutional standing settles the uncertainty of the district court's decision, which could have undercut Congress' intent in crafting Section 16(b) in the first place, say attorneys at Simpson Thacher.

  • Inside OCC's Retail Nondeposit Investment Products Refresh

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    In addition to clarifying safe and sound risk management practices generally, the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency's revised booklet on retail nondeposit investment products updates its guidance around certain sales practices in light of the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission's adoption of Regulation Best Interest, say attorneys at Debevoise.

  • Mirror, Mirror On The Wall, Is My Counterclaim Bound To Fall?

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    A Pennsylvania federal court’s recent dismissal of the defendants’ counterclaims in Morgan v. Noss should remind attorneys to avoid the temptation to repackage a claim’s facts and law into a mirror-image counterclaim, as this approach will often result in a waste of time and resources, says Matthew Selmasska at Kaufman Dolowich.

  • Why The SEC Is Targeting Short-And-Distort Schemes

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    The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission's recent crackdown on the illegal practice of short-and-distort trades highlights the urgent need for public companies to adopt proactive measures, including pursuing private rights of action, say attorneys at Baker McKenzie.

  • Series

    Playing Dungeons & Dragons Makes Me A Better Lawyer

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    Playing Dungeons & Dragons – a tabletop role-playing game – helped pave the way for my legal career by providing me with foundational skills such as persuasion and team building, says Derrick Carman at Robins Kaplan.

  • A Look At The Regulatory Scrutiny Facing Liquid Restaking

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    Recent U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission enforcement actions highlight the regulatory challenges facing emerging financial instruments like liquid restaking tokens and services, say Daniel Davis and Alexander Kim at Katten.

  • Del. Dispatch: Director Caremark Claims Need Extreme Facts

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    The Delaware Court of Chancery recently dismissed Caremark claims against the directors of Centene in Bricklayers Pension Fund of Western Pennsylvania v. Brinkley, indicating a high bar for a finding of the required element of bad faith for Caremark liability, and stressing the need to resist hindsight bias, say attorneys at Fried Frank.

  • 5 Insights Into FDIC's Final Rule On Big-Bank Resolution Plans

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    Although the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp.'s recently finalized rule expanding resolution planning requirements for large banks was generally adopted as proposed, it includes key changes related to filing deadlines, review and feedback, and incorporates lessons learned — particularly from last year's bank failures, say attorneys at Cleary.

  • Jarkesy Ruling May Redefine Jury Role In Patent Fraud

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    Regardless of whether the U.S. Supreme Court’s Jarkesy ruling implicates the direction of inequitable conduct, which requires showing that the patentee made material statements or omissions to the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office, the decision has created opportunities for defendants to argue more substantively for jury trials than ever before, say attorneys at Cadwalader.

  • 3 Leadership Practices For A More Supportive Firm Culture

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    Traditional leadership styles frequently amplify the inherent pressures of legal work, but a few simple, time-neutral strategies can strengthen the skills and confidence of employees and foster a more collaborative culture, while supporting individual growth and contribution to organizational goals, says Benjamin Grimes at BKG Leadership.

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