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Our experts frequently write blog posts about the findings of the research we are conducting.

Displaying 121-130 out of 328 results for "Weekly Regulatory Review".

SEC Litigation Releases: Week in Review (Part II) - October 4th, 2013

(Oct 2013)

SEC Obtains Asset Freeze and Other Emergency Relief in Ponzi Scheme Targeting Investors in Japan
October 3, 2013, (Litigation Release No. 22832)
The SEC was granted a temporary restraining order, asset freeze and other emergency relief againstEdwin Yoshihiro Fujinaga and his company MRI International, Inc.. Fujinaga allegedly raised more than $800 million from investors through MRI, an allegedly "fraudulent Ponzi scheme designed to misappropriate money from investors. "The defendants...

SEC Litigation Releases: Week in Review (Part I) - October 4th, 2013

(Oct 2013)

SEC Files Fraud Charges Against Universal Travel Group, Its Former CEO and Chair, Jiangping Jiang, and Its Former Director, Secretary and Interim CFO, Jing Xie
September 27, 2013, (Litigation Release No. 22823)
The SEC announced the filing of "fraud and related charges against Universal Travel Group, a China-based travel services company, its former CEO and Chair, Jiangping Jiang, and its former Director, Secretary and Interim CFO, Jing Xie." According to the SEC, Jiang and Xie "failed to...

FINRA Files Cease and Desist RE: John Carris Investments and Fibrocell Science

(Oct 2013)

Yesterday, the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA) announced a temporary cease and desist order against "John Carris Investments, LLC (JCI) and its CEO, George Carris, to immediately halt solicitations of its customers to purchase Fibrocell Science, Inc. stock without making proper disclosures."

According to FINRA's complaint, JCI manipulated the stock price of Fibrocell (FCSC) through unauthorized purchases and so-called 'matched trades'. In particular, between May and September...

SEC Litigation Releases: Week in Review - September 27th, 2013

(Sep 2013)

SEC Charges CEO of Video Game Company and Purported Consultant in Revenue Inflation Scheme
September 25, 2013, (Litigation Release No. 22813)
According to the complaint , in 2009 Troy Lyndon, CEO and CFO of Left Behind Games Inc, and his friend, Ronald Zaucha, schemed to "falsely inflate the company's revenue by nearly 1,300 percent in a one-year period through sham circular transactions." Left Behind Games "was founded in 2001 and touted itself as 'the only publicly-traded exclusive publisher...

SEC Approves Municipal Adviser Registration Requirement

(Sep 2013)

Late last week, the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) voted to adopt rules requiring municipal advisors to register with the commission if the advisor "provides advice on the issuance of municipal securities or about certain 'investment strategies' or municipal derivatives." This permanent registration requirement was required by Dodd-Frank (Section 975) and replaces the temporary registration requirement previously implemented by the SEC.

The registration requirement is meant to...

SEC Litigation Releases: Week in Review - September 20th, 2013

(Sep 2013)

Court Enters Final Judgment by Consent Against SEC Defendant Roland Kaufmann
September 19, 2013, (Litigation Release No. 22802)
Yesterday the US District Court for the Eastern District of New York entered a final judgment against Roland Kaufman. The judgment bars Kaufman from participating in penny stock offerings and from serving as a director or officer of a public company. The judgment stems from a July 2012 SEC complaint that allegedAxius, Inc., Jean-Pierre Neuhaus, and Roland Kaufmann...

What is Black-Scholes, Anyway?

(Sep 2013)

In the past, we have reviewed the basics of options as well as included some discussion of more exotic options, such as binary options and barrier options, but we haven't talked in detail about option pricing. There are a lot of great models for valuing options, but they can be a bit intimidating for the uninitiated, even though the underlying ideas are simple.

Any option's value is dependent upon the probability and timing of payouts. For example, how much would you be willing to pay for an...

FINRA Investor Alert: Private Placements

(Sep 2013)

Many of the riskiest financial products we have seen are sold as private placements. Generally speaking, private placements are investments sold directly to accredited investors, and are not registered with the SEC. Private placements include hedge funds, oil and gas partnerships, private real estate investment trusts, and other speculative investments.

Yesterday, FINRA released an Investor Alert on private placements. In it, they warn investors that sales abuses and even fraud have been...

FDIC Goes After Directors of Failed Banks

(Sep 2013)

In recent months, the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) has been filing a significant number of lawsuits against bank executives to recoup losses stemming from the onslaught of bank failures following the financial crisis. The annual number of bank failures reached a peak at 157 in 2010 and has declined steadily since.

These bank failures were a significant test of the FDIC system. The fund backing the FDIC guarantee has been depleted by nearly $90 billion over the past five years...

SLCG Research: Structured Product Based Variable Annuities

(Sep 2013)

In 2010, AXA Equitable began issuing a new kind of variable annuity that, in addition to traditional mutual fund-like subaccounts, also included an option for a structured product-like crediting formula linked to an underlying index such as the S&P 500. Our firm had done a lot of work on both structured products and variable annuities, so in late 2011 we started analyzing the structured product embedded in AXA's product, eventually writing a short research paper on the subject which we...

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