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Securities
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May 21, 2013
Mayer Brown Snags Real Estate Finance Pro From Dechert
Mayer Brown LLP said Friday it had picked up a Dechert LLP attorney with expertise in real estate finance and securities law to boost its banking and finance practice in Charlotte, N.C.
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May 21, 2013
Investors Prevail Over Citigroup In ARS Market-Bust Arbitration
Citigroup Global Markets Inc. must pay $1 million in damages to two Texas companies that faulted the firm for failing to pull their money out of the auction rate securities market before its collapse, an arbitration panel ruled Friday.
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May 21, 2013
NFP Directors Sued Over $1.3B Madison Dearborn Deal
The directors and executives of brokerage services firm National Financial Partners Corp. were hit with a proposed shareholder class action Tuesday over its April deal to be acquired by private equity investment firm Madison Dearborn Partners LLC for $1.3 billion.
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May 21, 2013
Thompson & Knight Dodges $2.5M Shareholder Fraud Appeal
A Texas appeals court declined Tuesday to revive a $2.5 million suit against Thompson & Knight LLP that alleged the firm helped a defunct home theater business transfer assets to a new venture and cut shareholders out of their investment in the company.
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May 21, 2013
Dreier Investors Say Profits Weren't Part Of Ponzi Scheme
Attorneys for two investors being sued for millions by Dreier LLP's Chapter 11 trustee told a New York bankruptcy judge Tuesday that the trustee can't prove that the profits they received from their investments in the defunct firm were part of a Ponzi scheme.
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May 21, 2013
EU Oil Price-Fixing Probe Could Rival Libor Scandal
The European Commission's probe of alleged manipulation of crude oil benchmark prices has expanded beyond major oil companies to include energy trading firms, in a crackdown experts say could echo the ongoing Libor scandal in both its sprawling scope and the avalanche of litigation it could bring from energy consumers.
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May 21, 2013
Watchdog Report Faults CFTC Head's MF Global Recusal
U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission Chairman Gary Gensler disregarded legal advice and needlessly recused himself from matters relating to MF Global Holdings Ltd. in November 2011 over concerns about his personal ties to then-CEO Jon Corzine, according to a Tuesday report.
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May 21, 2013
Lion Capital Head Pleads Guilty To $1.3M Fraud Scheme
The former operator of Lion Capital Management LLC pled guilty Tuesday to four felony mail and wire fraud counts in connection with a scheme in which he told investors he would put $1.3 million into a hedge fund, but instead spent the money on himself.
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May 21, 2013
Miami Law Firm Helped Run Ponzi Scheme, Investor Says
A Wisconsin man sued Miami attorney Jeffrey Tew and his firm Tew Cardenas LLP in Florida state court Thursday, claiming they helped a businessman set up and run what was effectively a Ponzi scheme based on fraudulent real estate investments in Costa Rica.
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May 21, 2013
Ill. Pension Fund Slaps AIG With Securities Fraud Suit
An Illinois pension fund on Friday sued American International Group Inc. and current and former executives in New York federal court, saying the insurer schemed to artificially inflate the value of its securities while concealing a risky portfolio that led to a 97 percent drop in AIG's stock price.
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May 21, 2013
Q&A With McKenna Long's David Brown
The pending rules regarding crowdfunding and the relaxation of the general solicitation prohibition in the JOBS Act may have the most day-to-day impact — eliminating a half-century old requirement on how and from whom companies can raise capital, says David Brown, head of McKenna Long & Aldridge LLP's corporate finance group.
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May 21, 2013
DOJ Slams S&P Bid To Toss Inflated RMBS Ratings Suit
The U.S. Department of Justice on Monday hit back at Standard & Poor's Financial Services LLC’s bid to dismiss a suit over allegedly flawed residential mortgage-backed securities ratings issued before the financial crisis, telling a California federal judge it had properly alleged fraud by the ratings firm.
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May 21, 2013
Ex-Digital Domain CEO, Directors Hit With Investor Suit
Two investment funds on Friday sued the former CEO and several executives of Digital Domain Media Group in New York state court, accusing them of withholding key information about the company’s rocky financial position before its initial public offering in 2011 and subsequent bankruptcy last year.
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May 21, 2013
Jury Convicts Atty Over Stock Fraud Scheme With Ex-NFLer
A Florida jury on Monday convicted a California attorney of conspiring with former NFL player Willie Gault and others to artificially inflate a heart-monitoring device company's stock through a series of fraudulent schemes.
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May 21, 2013
Herbalife Taps PwC As Auditor After KPMG Insider Scandal
Herbalife Ltd. said Tuesday it had chosen PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP as its auditor, replacing KPMG LLP after a partner at the firm was charged in early April with leaking confidential information about Herbalife and other clients to a friend who traded on the tips.
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May 21, 2013
WaMu Noteholders Can't Join $10B Fight, DC Circ. Says
The D.C. Circuit on Tuesday refused to let a group of Washington Mutual Bank noteholders enter Deutsche Bank AG's $10 billion suit over WaMu's poor-quality mortgages, ruling that their interest in the case was too conditional to justify intervening and that their inclusion could open the floodgates for other creditors.
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May 21, 2013
Dimon Survives, But Risk Concerns Loom For JPMorgan
JPMorgan Chase & Co. CEO Jamie Dimon will keep his chairman’s seat after investors defeated an effort to split the roles Tuesday, but slim re-election margins for the bank’s risk committee will fuel calls for board reforms, experts say.
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May 21, 2013
Gupta Asks 2nd Circ. To Overturn Conviction
Former Goldman Sachs Group Inc. director Rajat Gupta asked the Second Circuit on Tuesday to overturn his conviction for providing insider information to hedge fund founder Raj Rajaratnam, arguing the jury should not have heard certain wiretaps.
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May 21, 2013
Chevron Sues Sunoco Over Texas Pipeline Deal
A unit of Chevron Corp. fired off a derivative lawsuit Monday in Delaware Chancery Court on behalf of West Texas Gulf Pipeline Co. and against a subsidiary of Sunoco Inc., alleging that Sunoco's representatives on WTG's board approved an unfair pipeline lease.
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May 21, 2013
GOP Sens. Hammer Lew On IRS Targeting Scandal
Secretary of the Treasury Jack Lew on Tuesday said he will push regulators to speed up finishing capital, proprietary trading and other Dodd-Frank Act-mandated rules even as questions over the Internal Revenue Service's targeting of conservative groups dominated his appearance before a Senate panel.
Expert Analysis
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Tips For Your Rule 10b5-1 Trading Plan Policy
Now that investigations have been initiated by U.S. Attorney’s Offices and the SEC into possible abuses by corporate executives of Rule 10b5-1 trading plans, the private securities bar inevitably will follow suit and file litigation. Nevertheless, these plans continue to be an effective defense against allegations of insider trading, say attorneys with Pillsbury Winthrop Shaw Pittman LLP.
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4 Takeaways From 2nd Highest FCPA Penalty
A New York federal court recently entered a final judgment against a former Siemens AG executive for his alleged role in a purported $100 million bribery scheme for Siemens to obtain a $1 billion contract from Argentina. Third-party sham contracts continue to be a prevalent theme in the alleged facts contained in corruption enforcement filings and resolutions, say attorneys with Fulbright & Jaworski LLP.
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SEC Must Stop The Latest Effort To Impede Whistleblowers
Increasingly, employees have been presented with language in severance and settlement agreements that impose on whistleblowers a number of restrictions. These provisions pose a serious threat to the success of the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission's whistleblower program, say David Marshall and Debra Katz of Katz Marshall & Banks LLP.
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Mixed Messages Over Municipal Adviser Registration
In the three years since Congress mandated that all municipal advisers must register with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, there has been enormous debate about just what a 'municipal adviser' is. To make matters worse, the SEC is now sending mixed messages concerning when it might complete its rulemaking, say Thomas Potter and Benjamin Coulter of Burr & Forman LLP.
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Insights From An Under-The-Radar CDO Case
A case that seems to have gone relatively unnoticed is ASR Levensverzekering NV v. Swiss Re Financial Products Corporation. Dismissed by the New York Supreme Court, the case provides useful insights into the application of New York fraud and contract law in the context of complex financial transactions, say James Bliss and Kevin Broughel of Paul Hastings LLP.
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E-Discovery In The Cloud: Who Can Get Your Data?
Many lawyers are asking whether placing electronically stored information in the cloud could inadvertently waive the attorney-client privilege and whether the government or a civil litigant could obtain ESI directly from a cloud service provider. In answering these questions, there are a number of aspects of the cloud worth considering, say Timothy Broas and Matthew Saxon of Winston & Strawn LLP.
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Get Ready For A 'Substituted Compliance' Regime
In a complete 180-degree reversal of its previous position, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission is on the verge of accepting an international financial regulatory regime of mutual recognition. "Substituted compliance" will help inform foreign market participants about which rules they must follow when their swap activities cross U.S. borders, says Bradley Dizik of Tiberian Regulatory Advisers LLC.
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Why The Libor Lawsuits Are Not Dead
In the wake of a recent court ruling in the Southern District of New York, many people have suggested that London Interbank Offered Rate litigations are now nearly over. Although the ruling represents a significant victory for the defendant banks, and a major challenge to the litigation strategy of many of the claimants, it is by no means the end of the Libor litigations, says Ilan Guedj of ARPC.
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FINRA's Position On Pre-Inception Index Performance Data
FINRA has now formalized its position (albeit in a limited way) on pre-inception index performance data for exchange-traded products. Although the agency permits firms to distribute PIP data only to institutional investors, the recent guidance nonetheless provides some much-needed regulatory clarity for market participants, say Richard Morris and John O’Brien of Morgan Lewis & Bockius LLP.
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Lessons From Philips FCPA Settlement Over Polish Bribes
While Poland has not received particular Foreign Corrupt Practices Act enforcement focus over the years, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission's recent order against Koninklijke Philips Electronics NV over Polish bribes underscores the fact that, in given circumstances, any country can present high corruption risk, say attorneys with Fulbright & Jaworski LLP.