The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) and the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) have announced that the two agencies have approved a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) that will help ensure continued coordination and information sharing between the two agencies. The MOU updates and enhances a 2008 MOU to make it more relevant in the current…
Read moreThe Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) announced that Wells Fargo Advisors LLC agreed to settle charges of misconduct in the sale of financial products known as market-linked investments, or MLIs, to retail investors. According to the order, the SEC found that Wells Fargo generated large fees by improperly encouraging retail customers to actively trade the…
Read moreThe Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has announced that it has filed charges and obtained an asset freeze against the individuals and companies behind a $102 million Ponzi scheme that bilked investors throughout the U.S. According to the SEC’s complaint, the defendants defrauded more than 600 investors through sales of securities in issuers they controlled,…
Read moreThe Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) announced that Maurya C. Keating has been named an Associate Regional Director for the Investment Adviser and Investment Company examination program in the agency's New York Regional Office. She will join the agency later this month. Ms. Keating most recently served as a Lead Director/Vice President & Associate General…
Read moreThe Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) announced that Merrill Lynch, Pierce, Fenner & Smith Inc. will pay more than $15 million to settle charges that its employees misled customers into overpaying for Residential Mortgage Backed Securities (RMBS). Merrill Lynch agreed to repay more than $10.5 million to its customers and to pay penalties of approximately…
Read moreThe Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has informed the public that it has charged a former registered representative with defrauding long-standing brokerage customers in an $8 million investment scam. According to the SEC’s complaint, Steven Pagartanis, who was affiliated with a registered broker-dealer, told some investors – including retirees who had been Pagartanis’s customers for…
Read moreThe Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) announced that it has charged the owner of a Manhattan-based alternative investment firm with misappropriating close to $6 million in investor funds earmarked to finance the construction of an international airport in Belize. The SEC’s complaint alleges that between 2014 and 2017, Brent Borland sold more than $21 million…
Read moreThe SEC’s “SALI” tool will allow investors to identify individuals subject to judgments or orders in enforcement actions The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) announced the launch of an additional online search feature that enables investors to research whether the person trying to sell them investments has a judgment or order entered against them in…
Read moreThe Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) announced that it has charged the pastor of one of the largest Protestant churches in the country and a self-described financial planner in a scheme to defraud elderly investors by selling them interests in defunct, pre-Revolutionary Chinese bonds. The SEC's complaint alleges that, in 2013 and 2014, Kirbyjon Caldwell,…
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The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) informed the public that it has voted to propose new Rule 610T of Regulation NMS to conduct a Transaction Fee Pilot in NMS stocks. The proposed pilot would subject stock exchange transaction fee pricing, including “maker-taker” fee-and-rebate pricing models, to new temporary pricing restrictions across three test groups, and…
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