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Securities
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February 13, 2024
Beauty Company Hit With Derivative Suit Over Skin Tech Woes
Directors and officers at the Beauty Health Co. hid bad news about a defective skin care device for 18 months, leading to stock price drops, analyst downgrades and a securities class action when the truth was finally revealed, a shareholder alleges in a new Delaware Chancery Court complaint.
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February 13, 2024
Cannabis Site Co. Moves To Ax 'Rambling' Securities Suit
Decentral Life and its licensees asked a Colorado federal judge Monday to toss an investor's "rambling and incomprehensible" securities fraud suit accusing them of making false statements to trick him into investing more than $1.7 million, arguing most of his allegations fail under the federal pleading requirements.
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February 13, 2024
Hotel Rental Co. Hid Litigation And Failed Deal, Suit Says
Real estate company LuxUrban Hotels has been hit with a proposed class action alleging it lied about a 25-year deal with the Royalton Hotel in New York and multiple lawsuits over unpaid rent, which it says caused shares to decline after a short-seller report disclosed the issues.
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February 13, 2024
Wells Fargo, Ex-Exec Continue Bids To Win Bias Suit
A Wells Fargo unit and one of its former investment directors are pushing their competing bids for summary judgment in a disability bias suit, each claiming there is evidence to support their arguments regarding why the director's termination occurred.
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February 13, 2024
OpenText Wants Out Of Class Action Coverage Suit
OpenText told a Michigan federal court it should be dismissed from an insurer's suit seeking to avoid coverage of a class action from former Covisint shareholders alleging an unfair merger, saying it's not involved in the underlying case and its only alleged connection is that it acquired outstanding Covisint stock.
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February 13, 2024
Catching Up With Delaware's Chancery Court
A pizza chain, an energy company, a medical-device maker and a Manila casino were all hit with book-and-record demands last week in Delaware's Court of Chancery. A shoe company also walked away from a shareholder suit, two cryptocurrency companies tallied the costs of a broken merger, and three cigarette giants argued over Florida settlement payments.
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February 12, 2024
'Pig Butchering' Scheme Took Down Small Bank, Fed IG Says
The July collapse of a Kansas community bank appears tied to a type of crypto scam known as pig butchering, enabled by a failure of internal controls that allowed its former CEO to allegedly siphon off enough money to force the bank's closure, according to a new report by a bank regulatory watchdog.
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February 12, 2024
Fired Wells Fargo Exec Nabs Partial Win In Retaliation Suit
A California magistrate judge on Monday granted a partial win to a former Wells Fargo executive who sued the bank for allegedly firing him because he was a whistleblower, rejecting arguments that the bank is preempted by a provision of the National Banking Act.
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February 12, 2024
Investors Win Class Cert. Against Failed COVID Test Maker
Investors suing biotech company Talis Biomedical Corp. have received class certification in a suit alleging the company hurt investors when trading prices sank a month after its initial public offering when the company failed to secure U.S. Food and Drug Administration approval for its flagship testing platform.
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February 12, 2024
Chancery Partly Shoots Down Moelis Founder Control Suit
Global investment bank Moelis & Co. lost much of its bid Monday for summary dismissal of a stockholder suit seeking to invalidate stockholder agreements said to have wrongly ceded board powers to company founder and CEO Kenneth Moelis, Delaware's Court of Chancery ruled late Monday.
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February 12, 2024
Bribery Is Not Securities Fraud, FirstEnergy Tells 6th Circ.
FirstEnergy Corp. is asking the Sixth Circuit to overturn class certification in a case accusing the company of committing securities fraud in connection with a multimillion-dollar bribe made to a convicted politician, arguing that "half-truths" about the company's aging power plants cannot be the basis of class-wide claims.
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February 12, 2024
Bank Trade Chief Warns Of Rules 'Masquerading As Guidance'
The American Bankers Association's chief executive fired off a warning shot at federal regulators on Monday over their use of agency guidance, cautioning that several recent documents addressing certain bank fees and other practices are no substitute for formal rulemaking.
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February 12, 2024
SEC Says Long Islander Aided $2M 'Free Riding' Scam
A Long Island 25-year-old has agreed to settle U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission allegations that he played a key role in a $2 million "free riding" scheme to take advantage of "instant deposit" credits offered by broker-dealer firms.
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February 12, 2024
Generator Co. Brass Accused Of Lying About Finances
Top executives and board members of Generac, a power generation equipment manufacturer, were hit with a shareholder derivative lawsuit filed in Delaware federal court on Monday, accusing them of lying about the company's financial outlook and the reliability of its products.
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February 12, 2024
TradeStation Fined By FINRA For Supervisory Failures
Broker-dealer TradeStation Securities agreed to pay $700,000 to the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority to settle claims that it failed to properly use anti-money laundering programs to alert the firm of suspicious trading by its customers, and that it did not implement proper procedures for the sales of certain securities.
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February 12, 2024
Katten Says It Can't Be Forced To Stay In Madoff Suit
Katten Muchin Rosenman LLP told a New York bankruptcy judge that the difficulties the trustee for Bernard L. Madoff Investment Securities may have in a suit to claw back $2 billion in transfers do not justify keeping the firm on the case for years with no prospect of pay.
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February 12, 2024
Flagstar Takes Aim At 'Nonsensical' $3M Signature Fraud Suit
Flagstar Bank has urged a New York federal judge to toss a cash advance lender's suit that seeks millions of dollars allegedly stolen from its account at Signature Bank years before the bank failed, saying the theory that Flagstar should be on the hook for Signature's liabilities as its acquirer is "nonsensical."
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February 12, 2024
Crypto Pastor Enlisted Family For Scam, Colo. Officials Say
A pastor accused of running a fraudulent cryptocurrency scheme targeting Christians also recruited his father, in-laws and other church leaders to sell the worthless coin in exchange for commissions of up to $32,500, Colorado's securities commissioner said Monday.
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February 12, 2024
FTX Says User Agreements Don't Sink $157M Clawback
A lawsuit to recoup cryptocurrency withdrawn from defunct trading platform FTX Trading Ltd. in the run-up to its Chapter 11 bankruptcy shouldn't be tossed, FTX told a Delaware bankruptcy court, saying the court can't determine who owned the $157.3 million of digital assets held in customer accounts at the motion to dismiss stage.
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February 12, 2024
Del. Justices Refuse Deutsche Bank's Vik Case Appeal
A missed deadline has sunk Deutsche Bank's hopes for Delaware Supreme Court review of a Chancery Court ruling rejecting its midcase appeal in a long-running recovery suit targeting $50 million allegedly controlled by holdings of Norwegian billionaire investor Alexander Vik.
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February 12, 2024
Musk Can't Dodge SEC Questions About $44B Twitter Buy
A California federal judge has told Elon Musk that he must appear before the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission to testify about his $44 billion purchase of the social media platform formerly known as Twitter, waving off the billionaire's assertions that the agency was harassing him via a series of seemingly endless investigations.
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February 12, 2024
Siblings Fail To Escape SEC's $112M Pump-And-Dump Suit
A brother and sister named in a U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission case concerning an alleged pump-and-dump scheme that defrauded investors of $112 million failed to escape the suit after a Texas federal judge ruled that the SEC successfully showed that the siblings had at least a general awareness of their role in the scheme, among other things.
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February 12, 2024
Prosecutors Say Paxton Can't Alter History To 'Dodge' Fraud Case
Prosecutors have urged a Texas state court to reject a bid from state Attorney General Ken Paxton to dismiss a 2015 securities fraud case against him on speedy trial grounds, saying he is attempting to rewrite history and use delays he helped create to "dodge prosecution."
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February 12, 2024
Discord Stock Traders Say Prosecutors' Evidence Is Faulty
A group of men accused of operating a multimillion-dollar pump-and-dump scheme on Discord and other social media asked a Texas federal judge to sanction the government, saying that prosecutors had cherry-picked evidence to create exhibits that are misleading at best and inaccurate at worst.
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February 12, 2024
Frank Execs Say JPMorgan Is Withholding Communications
Charlie Javice and Olivier Amar, the indicted former executives of student loan startup Frank, asked a Manhattan federal judge Saturday for an extension of time to decide on raising an advice-of-counsel defense at their trial, saying they can't make a decision yet because JPMorgan is withholding discovery of their communications with Frank's general counsel.
Expert Analysis
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5 DOJ Enforcement Priorities To Note From Recent Remarks
Principal Associate Deputy Attorney General Marshall Miller’s recent speech provided a glimpse into the U.S. Department of Justice’s corporate criminal enforcement priorities — from national security concerns to mergers and acquisitions — with takeaways for companies’ compliance programs, say Joseph Jay and Jennifer Le at Sheppard Mullin.
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5th Circ. Ruling Reminds Attys That CBP Can Search Devices
The Fifth Circuit’s recent Malik v. Department of Homeland Security decision adds to the chorus of federal courts holding that border agents don’t need a warrant to search travelers’ electronic devices, so attorneys should consider certain special precautions to secure privileged information when reentering the U.S., says Jennifer Freel at Jackson Walker.
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Series
ESG Around The World: European Union
As the EU makes ESG regulation a priority, companies — both those based in the EU and others just doing business there — need to keep abreast of myriad new legislation that has either already taken effect or will in the near future, as noncompliance could result in fines, damages and director liability, say attorneys at Steptoe & Johnson.
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How Gov't Agencies Will Fare In The Event Of A Shutdown
With a federal shutdown potentially set to begin at the end of this month, it may be useful to consider the approximate timelines that agencies such as the Federal Trade Commission and IRS have announced for curtailing operations, and potential strategies for mitigating challenges that may arise while agency functions are limited, say attorneys at Cleary.
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Avoiding The Ethical Pitfalls Of Crowdfunded Legal Fees
The crowdfunding of legal fees has become increasingly common, providing a new way for people to afford legal services, but attorneys who accept crowdsourced funds must remember several key ethical obligations to mitigate their risks, say Hilary Gerzhoy and Julienne Pasichow at HWG.
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Tornado Cash Saga Presents Thorny Issues For Fintechs
A recent Texas federal court ruling and a U.S. Department of Justice indictment concerning the cryptocurrency mixer service Tornado Cash raise novel and important issues regarding smart contracts that could complicate the development and nature of decentralized crypto projects, as well as the future of fintech business models, say attorneys at Venable.
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Energy Trading Cos. Must Review Electronic Comms Policies
After recent enforcement actions by U.S. and U.K. regulators against energy trading firms — and with the possibility of action by the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission looming — companies involved in energy markets must take steps to review and strengthen electronic communications protocols, say Tanya Bodell and Christopher Hoyle at StoneTurn.
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Opinion
US Crypto Needs Regulatory Clarity In Order To Thrive
As the crypto industry continues to mature, now is the time for the U.S. government to implement a clear and consistent regulatory framework in order to weed out bad actors and support industry growth, fairer access, stability, innovation and consumer protection, says Gavin Michael at Bakkt.
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What SEC Actions Against NFTs May Mean For Issuers
The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission’s recent charges against two non-fungible token issuers, Impact Theory and Stoner Cats, suggests that there could be additional SEC scrutiny of NFTs down the line, and that issuers should consider whether their assets might create an investment contract regulated under federal securities laws, say attorneys at Wilson Sonsini.
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Takeaways From Recent Corporate Cooperation Rulings
Recent decisions from New York and New Jersey federal courts in U.S. v. Coburn and U.S. v. Tournant suggest that a company’s consistent communication and cooperation with prosecutors does not render it a government actor, but also highlight certain internal investigation pitfalls for corporations to avoid, say attorneys at Sidley.
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2 Cases May Expand CFPB's Reach On Deceptive Practices
In two separate cases, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau is asserting a broad interpretation of who is subject to the Consumer Financial Protection Act's prohibition on unfair, deceptive, or abusive acts and practices, raising questions about what an expansion of its authority might mean for consumer credit markets, say John Coleman and Leslie Meredith at Orrick.
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Why Calif. Applying Del. Caremark Standard Is A Big Deal
A California court of appeal’s recent Kanter v. Reed ruling, which found for the first time that Delaware's Caremark standard is consistent with California law, demonstrates the importance of creating and using board-level reporting mechanisms that fulfill oversight duties, say attorneys at Morgan Lewis.
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Biden Impeachment Probe May Turn On Definition Of 'Benefit'
The U.S. House of Representatives’ impeachment inquiry into whether President Joe Biden benefited from his son Hunter Biden's business dealings could turn on a narrow interpretation of “personal benefit,” but a broader definition also has legal precedent in securities and bribery laws, says Andrew Vollmer at George Mason University.
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What Large Language Models Mean For Document Review
Courts often subject parties using technology assisted review to greater scrutiny than parties conducting linear, manual document review, so parties using large language models for document review should expect even more attention, along with a corresponding need for quality control and validation, say attorneys at Sidley.
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Series
Participating In Living History Makes Me A Better Lawyer
My role as a baron in a living history group, and my work as volunteer corporate counsel for a book series fan association, has provided me several opportunities to practice in unexpected areas of law — opening doors to experiences that have nurtured invaluable personal and professional skills, says Matthew Parker at the Nebraska Department of Health and Human Services.