All articles by Bruce Carton – Page 3
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Blog
Compliance fail: Chinese bank employees publicly spanked for poor performance
A disturbing video of a Chinese bank's effort to improve employee performance -- through public, violent spankings of employees -- was posted yesterday. The video, which will make even the most hardened U.S. compliance officer cringe, shows a line of employees from Changzhi Rural Commercial Bank being subjected to an ...
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SEC prevails again in latest circuit court challenge to APs
Constitutional challenges to the SEC’s use of administrative proceedings to carry out enforcement actions continue to find no success in federal circuit court. Last week, the Eleventh Circuit joined the three other circuits that have considered and rejected such challenges. More from Bruce Carton.
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Sen. Warren, Chair White and the circle of disappointment
At a hearing this week, Sen. Elizabeth Warren tried to hang her "disappointment" on SEC Chair Mary Jo White for the third time in 12 months. This time, to Sen. Warren's surprise, Chair White was ready to fight disappointment with disappointment.
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Court rules SEC need not reimburse deponents for 'bacchanalian adventure'
Bacchus is the Roman god of wine and intoxication (equated with the Greek Dionysus). "Bacchanalia," or orgies in honor of Dionysus, were introduced in Rome around 200 BCE but eventualy got so out of hand that they were forbidden by the Roman Senate in 186 BCE. Roughly 2,000 years later, ...
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With latest $17 million, SEC whistleblower award firehose remains on full blast
Today, the SEC announced yet another blockbuster whistleblower award--more than $17 million to a former company employee who the SEC credited with submitting a detailed tip that "substantially advanced the agency’s investigation and ultimate enforcement action." In the past month alone, five whistleblowers have received a total of more than ...
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SEC Enforcement Hits Morgan Stanley for Cybersecurity Failure
The SEC brought its latest case under Regulation S-P today, announcing a settled administrative proceeding against Morgan Stanley Smith Barney LLC. Morgan Stanley agreed to pay a $1 million penalty to settle the agency's charges that it failed to protect customer data, some of which was hacked and offered for ...
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Senior SEC enforcement official Stephen Cohen to depart agency this month
Stephen Cohen, associate director for the SEC’s Enforcement Division, plans to leave the agency later this month after 12 years of service. A senior member of the Commission’s enforcement staff, Cohen joined the SEC in 2004 and has served as associate director since 2011. Bruce Carton has more.
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SEC Names Christopher Hetner as Senior Advisor on Cybersecurity
Just two weeks after SEC Chair Mary Jo White identified cybersecurity as the "biggest risk facing the financial system," the SEC further strengthened its focus in this area by naming Christopher R. Hetner to the newly-created position of Senior Advisor to the Chair for Cybersecurity Policy.
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The ‘I did not apply my mind’ defense to insider trading
Enforcement blogger Bruce Carton looks at a recent insider trading case, in which South Africa’s securities regulator agreed to reduce the defendant’s penalty because he claimed he “did not apply his mind to the applicable legislation at the time of the trading” but was now deeply sorry for his actions.
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SEC: Cyber-security now biggest risk facing financial system
In an interview on May 17, SEC Chair Mary Jo White made an eye-opening comment about cyber-security. Cyber-security, she stated, is now the “biggest risk facing the financial system.” What does that mean for the Commission going forward? Bruce Carton reports.
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Some (minor) movement in SEC nominations of Fairfax and Peirce
It wasn't much, but given the complete lack of movement in the languishing nominations of Hester Peirce and Lisa Fairfax to be SEC commissioners, we'll take it. On Thursday, May 19, the U.S. Senate Banking Committee finally voted to advance the nominations of Peirce and Fairfax to the full Senate ...
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Congress to SEC: You'll get nothing and like it
Twice in recent years, the House Appropriations Committee's approved budget for the SEC has been $222 million less than the SEC requested. For FY 2017, the SEC requested a budget of $1.781 billion. Anyone care to guess what the Committee approved?
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60 Minutes: The inside story of the fall of Roomy Khan and Raj Rajaratnam
Bruce Carton offers a look at a 60 Minutes piece called “Inside Edge” about former stock analyst Roomy Khan, who was caught early by federal prosecutors investigating insider-trading by hedge funds and ultimately became a critical government informant in the criminal case that brought down Galleon Group's Raj Rajaratnam and ...
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BlogSEC’s whistleblower office on winning roll
The SEC’s Office of the Whistleblower has been on a winning streak, which continued this week as it announced an award of between $5 million and $6 million to a former company insider whose tips uncovered hidden securities violations. The office has now awarded more than $67 million to 29 ...
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SEC's former AMU co-chief Marshall Sprung joins Blackstone Group
Marshall S. Sprung, former co-chief of the SEC Division of Enforcement’s Asset Management Unit since 2013, is reportedly joining Blackstone Group LP as the firm's global head of compliance. As emphasized in a speech last week by SEC Enforcement Director Andrew Ceresney, the Enforcement Division has recently increased its scrutiny ...
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After rejection, SEC whistleblower's persistence leads to $3.5 million award
On Friday, the SEC announced its latest whistleblower award -- a sizable one that is noteworthy for at least three reasons.
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SEC in the movies: 'The Big Short'
The SEC and the topic of "regulatory capture" make a brief but memorable appearance in The Big Short, the Academy Award-winning film based on the best-selling book by Michael Lewis.
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What is the 'KickAss Insider Trading Forum?'
It seems to me that if you are actually able to create an online forum of hackers and others that allows you to engage in profitable insider trading, that you might want to keep that on the "down low." According to a recently-published interview, the "KickAss Insider Trading Forum" ...
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Pros vs. Joes: SEC enforcement headlines edition
Yesterday, however, the UK's Daily Mail weighed in on the SEC's recent Stephen Ferrone case with a headline that shows the difference between pros like itself and the rest of us average Joes in the "click economy."
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2016 SEC trial scorecard update: agency moves to 4-0 in trial verdicts
Yesterday, the SEC continued its undefeated streak in its FY 2016 federal court trials. The SEC announced that on April 29, following a two week trial in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois, a jury returned a verdict in favor of the SEC in its case ...