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Banking/Financial Services

Mar 20, 2023

SEC Obtains Court Judgment Against Unregistered Municipal Advisors

Fraudulent La. Bond Offering to Improve a City Sewer System

One of the consequences of the collapse of various portions of the financial markets in the Great Recession of 2007-2009 was the passage of the Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act of 2010, better known as the Dodd-Frank Act.» Read More

Mar 13, 2023

Fiddling With FICC: Proposed Rule Changes re Capital Requirements

Stress Test Protocols and Minimum Fund Requirements

The Fixed Income Clearing Corporation (“FICC”), a subsidiary of the Depository Trust & Clearing Corporation (“DTCC”) created in 2003, as discussed in my June 8, 2021 blog “Fixing FICC: Agency Proposes Rule Changes to Encourage More Repo Closing,” provides a critical piece of the “plumbing” of the U.S.» Read More

Feb 06, 2023

Even-handed Thievery: SEC Sanctions Unregistered Investment Adviser for Fraudulent: I) Investment Advice, AND II) Filings for PPP Loans

Gregory Blotnick (“Blotnick”), age 35, is a resident of Palm Beach, Florida. He was the founder, sole owner, managing partner, and only employee of Brattle Street Capital, LLC, a New York limited liability company (“BSC”) headquartered in New York, NY. BSC is the unregistered investment adviser to a private investment fund, BSC Opportunistic Equity, LP, a Delaware limited partnership (the “Fund”), founded by Blotnick in June 2019, and headquartered in New York, NY.» Read More

Jan 09, 2023

Investment Esoterica: A Stockless Triptych

One of the consequences of the last 13+ years of Quantitative Easing has been an indefatigable search for better investment returns. Although the recent rediscovery of inflation by the Federal Open Market Committee of the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System has resulted in significant increases in the federal fund rate (the 10-year Treasury Note now yields over 3.2 %), investors have been quite adventuresome in “placing their bets.”» Read More

Dec 12, 2022

‘No Exit’: SEC Sanctions Investment Adviser for Impeding University Investors from Departing a Private Fund

Deccan Value Investors L.P. (“Deccan”) is a Connecticut limited partnership, operating as an investment adviser registered with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (“SEC”) since 2011. Deccan, according to the SEC’s Aug. 3, 2022, Order Instituting Administrative and Cease-and-Desist Proceedings (“Order”), “pursued a long-term, concentrated, low-turnover, research-oriented, fundamental investment strategy, investing all its dozen or so client accounts in a dozen or so companies.”» Read More

Dec 05, 2022

Goldman and the Juliet Problem: SEC Sanctions Adviser for Faulty ESG Policies

In William Shakespeare’s great play “Romeo and Juliet,” Act 2, Scene 2, Juliet famously asks:

What’s in a name? That which we call a rose by any other name would smell as sweet.

But sometimes, as Gertrude Stein and then Ernest Hemingway opined in a commentary on Juliet’s pronouncement: “A rose, is a rose, is an onion.”» Read More

Nov 28, 2022

Only Sell What You Know-II: Selling Variable Interest Structure Products Is a Fraud on the Unsuspecting

The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (“SEC”) has become increasingly concerned about the sale of complex investment products to retail investors, especially as investors seek enhanced returns in a period (from the Great Recession in 2008 until the Spring of 2022) when the recurring commitment of Quantitative Easing policies by the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (“FRB”) and the interest-rate strictures by the FRB’s Open Market Committee (“FOMC”) had driven down yields on debt investments to just above 0%.» Read More