Enforcement Actions: Week in Review - December 5th, 2014
(Dec 2014)
SEC ENFORCEMENT ACTIONS
SEC Charges California Resident With Fraudulent Sales of Stock
December 2, 2014 (Litigation Release No. 268)
The SEC has charged Vinay Kumar Nevatia for fraudulently selling $900,000 of private shares of CSS Corp. The SEC contends that Kumar, living in Palo Alto under several aliases, sold shares in 2011 and 2012 that he had already sold in 2008. Kumar has never been registered with the SEC.
SEC Announces Fraud Charges Against Two Executives in Scheme Involving...
Enforcement Actions: Week in Review - October 3rd, 2014
(Oct 2014)
SEC ENFORCEMENT ACTIONS
SEC v. Patrick G. Rooney, John R. Rooney, and Positron Corporation, Civil Action No. 9:14-cv-81224-KAM (U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Florida)
October 3, 2014 (Litigation Release No. 23103)
The SEC announced that on September 30, it had filed a civil injunctive action against Positron Corporation, Patrick Rooney, the company's former CEO and John R. Rooney, a promoter of penny stocks. Positron, a microcap company, as well as Patrick Rooney and...
FINRA Enforcement Actions: Month in Review
(Jun 2014)
MAY 2014 SELECTED FINRA ENFORCEMENT ACTIONS
FIRMS FINED
ABN AMRO Clearing Chicago LLC (CRD #14020, Chicago, Illinois)
ABN AMRO Clearing Chicago LLC consented to a censure and $95,000 fine for allegedly failing "to report short interest positions to the New York Stock Exchange and FINRA on certain settlement dates, and submitt[ing] to FINRA an inaccurate short-interest position report." FINRA found that the firm's supervisory system did not provide for supervision reasonably designed to achieve...
FINRA Enforcement Actions: Month in Review
(May 2014)
APRIL 2014 SELECTED FINRA ENFORCEMENT ACTIONS
FIRMS FINED
The Huntington Investment Company (CRD #16986, Columbus, Ohio)
The Huntington Investment Company consented to a $25,000 fine and censure. The firm consented to an entry of "findings that it failed to provide notice to the MSRB via the Electronic Municipal Market Access System (EMMA) that no preliminary official statements or official statements were to be prepared for bond anticipation note offerings in which the firm participated."...
Enforcement Actions: Week in Review - May 2nd, 2014
(May 2014)
SEC ENFORCEMENT ACTIONS
SEC Charges Barry R. Bekkedam with Defrauding Investment Advisory Clients in Connection with Multimillion Dollar Rothstein Ponzi Scheme
April 30, 2014, (Litigation Release No. 22983)
According to the complaint, Barry R. Bekkedam, former SEC-registered investment advisor and former owner, Chairman, and Chief Executive Officer of Ballamor Capital Management, LLC, "fraudulently induced, or assisted in inducing, his advisory clients and others to invest approximately...
Enforcement Actions: Week in Review - March 21st, 2014
(Mar 2014)
SEC ENFORCEMENT ACTIONS
Manager of Pre-IPO Investment Funds Settles Fraud Claims
March 20, 2014, (Litigation Release No. 22949)
Frank Mazzola,brokerage firm Felix Investments, LLC, and investment adviserFacie Libre Management, Associates, LLC, have been charged with defrauding "investors in funds created to purchase shares of Facebook, Twitter, and other technology companies prior to their initial public offerings." According to the SEC, Mazzola and Felix Investments "arranged to be...
SEC Litigation Releases: Week in Review - February 14th, 2014
(Feb 2014)
SEC Charges James Y. Lee for Defrauding His Advisory Clients
February 14, 2014, (Litigation Release No. 22927)
According to the complaint, James Y. Lee defrauded his advisory clients in several ways including "charg[ing] some clients fees...based on false performance and conceal[ing] from them that they had actually incurred realized losses," failing to disclose information about his background including "a criminal conviction for embezzlement and an SEC cease-and-desist order for his role in...
Credit Default Swaps on Steroids: UBS's Willow Fund
(Jan 2014)
We previously published a working paper on how investors in Oppenheimer's Champion Income Fund lost 80% in 2008 when peer group funds lost about 25%. Our Champion Income Fund paper is available on our website. Oppenheimer had increased Champion Income Fund's exposure to CMBS through credit default swaps and total return swaps in 2007 and 2008. Figure 1 reproduces a figure from our 2010 paper which demonstrates that the leverage Oppenheimer took on through the swaps fully explained the...
SEC Litigation Releases: Week in Review - January 17th, 2014
(Jan 2014)
SEC Charges Former Senior Executives of Public Company Subsidiary with Falsifying Financial Records and Circumventing Internal Controls
January 15, 2014, (Litigation Release No. 22906)
This week, the SEC announced charges against Christopher Hohol and Brian Poshak, "formerly the senior vice president for operations and the controller, respectively, of Veolia Special Services, a fourth-tier United States subsidiary of Veolia Environnement S.A." According to the SEC, the defendants falsified...
