SEC Litigation Releases: Week in Review - June 29th, 2012
(Jun 2012)
SEC Shuts Down Mortgage Fund Ponzi-like Scheme
June 28, 2012, (Litigation Release No. 22406)
According to the complaint (opens to PDF), Small Business Capital Corp. ("SB Capital") and Mark Feathers ("Feathers"), its principal, are operating an "alleged Ponzi-like scheme." $42 million have been raised by SB Capital and Feathers through selling securities issued by their mortgage investment funds, Investors Prime Fund, LLC and SBC Portfolio Fund, LLC ("Funds"). The Funds attracted more than 400...
SEC Litigation Releases: Week in Review - June 15th, 2012
(Jun 2012)
Promoters of Convicted Ponzi Scheme Operator Jeffrey L. Mowen Ordered to Pay Over $20 Million in Disgorgement and Civil Penalties
June 13, 2012, (Litigation Release No. 22393)
The US District Court for the District of Utah granted the SEC's motion for entry of final judgment against Defendants Michael W. Averett, Michael G. Butcher, Thomas R. Fry, Gary W. Hansen, James B. Mooring, and Bevan J. Wilde, who allegedly "acted as promoters...through the unregistered offer and sale of high-yield...
SEC Litigation Releases: Week in Review - June 8th, 2012
(Jun 2012)
Court Enters Final Judgments, Including Indemnity Bars, Against Rajnish K. Das and Stormy L. Dean, Former CFOs of infoUSA, Inc.
June 1, 2012, (Litigation Release No. 22388)
As a result of the SEC complaint against Rajnish K. Das and Stormy L. Dean, the US District Court for the District of Nebraska barred the pair from serving as an officer or director of a public company for three years and levied a civil penalty of $50,000 against each of them. In the complaint, the SEC alleged Das and Dean...
SEC Litigation Releases: Week in Review - June 1st, 2012
(Jun 2012)
SEC Charges Two Feeders for One of South Florida's Largest-Ever Ponzi Schemes,
May 31, 2012, (Litigation Release No. 22383)
The SEC charged George Levin and Frank Preve with perpetrating a Ponzi scheme through which they raised nearly $160 million from close to 200 investors in less than two years. The defendants used the investor funds to purchase (fraudulent) discounted legal settlements from Scott Rothstein (former Florida attorney). Rothstein then used the investor funds to make Ponzi...
SLCG Research: Dual Directional Structured Products
(May 2012)
Earlier this month, SLCG released a new research paper that values Dual Directional Structured Products (DDSPs). DDSPs are debt securities that feature payoffs very much like a long straddle position on the underlying asset for small price movements -- the investor realizes gains if the underlying asset increases or decreases in price (the origin of the term 'dual directional') within a certain range during the term of the note.
DDSPs differ from a conventional straddle position in a number...
Bill Luby on VIX-Related Exchange-Traded Products
(Apr 2012)
Bill Luby, who writes at the VIX and More blog and Expiring Monthly: The Options Traders Journal, is one of the most respected voices on all things related to the CBOE S&P 500 Volatility Index, also known as the VIX. We highly recommend anyone interested in the VIX and volatility-related derivates check out his blog, which has a variety of useful analysis and commentary.
Recently there has been a lot of coverage related to TVIX and otherexchange-traded products linked to the VIX. Here at...
SEC Sends Letter to Issuers of Structured Notes
(Apr 2012)
Recently the SEC sent out a letter to certain financial institutions regarding their offerings of structured notes. The letter was sent by Amy M. Starr, the Chief of the Office of Capital Markets Trends, Division of Corporation Finance. In the letter the SEC urges the structured note issuers to disclose key information with regard to the offerings, such as product pricing and use of issuing proceeds.
The SEC highlighted a number of potentially confusing aspects of structured notes and their...
SEC Litigation Releases: Week in Review (Part I) - April 13th, 2012
(Apr 2012)
Due to the high volume of SEC litigation releases over the previous week, we are summarizing the releases in two parts. This is the first of the two parts.
Fromer Syntax-Brillian Corp. CEO Ordered to Pay More than $11 Million for Insider Trading and Financial Fraud
April 9, 2012, (Litigation Release No. 22324)
The US District Court for the District of Arizona entered a final judgment against James Li -- former CEO and Director of Syntax-Brillian Corp. -- ordering him to pay over $2 million in...
Is There No Tracking Error for ETNs?
(Apr 2012)
Some investors may think that while ETFs are subject to various tracking errors, ETNs are not. The argument goes that index-tracking ETFs often hold part or the entire portfolio underlying their targeted index and are thus subject to imperfect tracking and transaction costs. ETNs, on the other hand, are debt instruments, and have returns guaranteed by their issuers.
It turns out, however, that the daily return of an ETN investment may not necessarily equal the leverage ratio times the daily...
SEC Litigation Releases: Week in Review (Part II) - March 23rd, 2012
(Mar 2012)
Due to the high volume of litigation releases from the Securities and Exchange Commission over the past week, we're spreading this week's review over two posts. This is the second of the two posts.
SEC Settles Litigation with Former Veritas Software Corporation Head of Sales
March 22, 2012, (Litigation Release No. 22304)
The US District Court for the Northern District of California entered a settled final judgment against Paul A. Sallaberry -- former head of sales of Veritas Software...
