Here are some recent compliance-related stories that caught my attention. The Saga of MF Global – Don’t Shoot the Messenger, Fire the Chief Compliance Officer by Tom Fox Both the DOJ minimum best practices and the amendment to the US Sentencing Guidelines, giving the CCO direct access to a company’s Board of Directors, would seem … Read more »
We Are the 2%!
Occupy Sesame Street! The shirt of the day from Woot! (Is it too soon?) Read more »
Private Company Shares, Valuation, and Employee Stock Repurchases
There has always been a theoretical discussion that there could be insider trading on private company shares. I have not seen the theory tested in court. However, a recent enforcement case by the SEC gets close to the theory. The case involves a company re-purchasing shares from employees at a discounted price. The SEC makes … Read more »
FTC, Bloggers, and Disclosure
The Federal Trade Commission is continuing to pursue bloggers who fail to disclose that they received incentives to discuss a company’s products. Back in December, the Federal Trade Commission released new guidelines that specifically required bloggers to disclose any material connections to a product or company they are writing about. The FTC is focusing its … Read more »
Placement Agent Policies for Massachusetts Public Pension Systems
The local retirement boards in Massachusetts are subject to new regulations regarding placement agents. That means if you have one of the boards as investor in your fund or a client in your advisory business, you need to supply new information to your clients/investors. Public Employee Retirement Administration Commission is the umbrella regulatory organization that … Read more »
The Cost of Regulating Fund Managers and Investment Advisers
A group of organizations with Investment Adviser stakeholders engaged the Boston Consulting Group to conduct an economic analysis of IA oversight scenarios (.pdf) in the Securities and Exchange Commission’s study released in January 2011. The analysis came down solidly in favor of increased funding of the SEC as the solution for increased oversight of investment … Read more »
Rudy – Securities Fraud
Who cares how much effort I put in, if it doesn’t produce any results. In a sad turn of event, Daniel “Rudy” Ruettinger was charged by the SEC with securities fraud. Ruettiger and 10 of the scheme’s other participants have agreed to settle the SEC’s charges without admitting or denying the allegations. (I guess they … Read more »
Compliance Bits & Pieces for December 16
These are some compliance related stories that caught my attention: Dodd-Frank Rules Will Crush Employment, Banks Warn by Paul Sperry for Investors Business Daily Job-killing bank regulations threaten to wipe out all the gains in private-sector employment since the recovery began, the industry warns. Washington, however, is hiring thousands more bureaucrats to enforce the rules. … Read more »
FCPA Conviction Upheld
There are few court cases involving the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act. Most of those accused quickly settle and move on. With few court cases that means the appellate decisions helping to interpret the FCPA are rare. Yesterday we had one of those rare sightings. Frederic Bourke was convicted of FCPA violations in 2009. Bourke co-founded … Read more »
Compliance and the South Pole
We reckoned now that we were at the Pole. Of course, every one of us knew that we were not standing on the absolute spot; it would be an impossibility with the time and the instruments at our disposal to ascertain that exact spot. But we were so near it that the few miles which … Read more »