The dismissal of an Apple REIT class action lawsuit against David Lerner Associates Inc. in U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of New York should have little effect on the Apple REIT arbitration cases that are being resolved through Financial Industry Regulatory Authority arbitration. In fact, most investors are…
The U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Florida is holding that an arbitration award granted to investors cannot be vacated under the Federal Arbitration Act just because an arbitrator exhibited obvious partiality when failing to reveal that he wrote a dissent in an unrelated arbitration that allegedly showed…
In Senior Executives Association v. United States, U.S. District Court for the District of Maryland Judge Alexander Williams said that the privacy rights of thousands of senior federal workers could be violated if a Stop Trading on Congressional Knowledge Act provision, which mandates that these employees’ financial information is disclosed…
On March 22, Senator John Cornyn (R-Texas) introduced S. 652, which would mandate that plaintiffs’ lawyers in private securities actions reveal via sworn certification any fees or other conflicts of interest that might have impacted their retention of clients. Dubbed the “Securities Litigation Attorney Accountability and Transparency Act,” the bill…
The Securities and Exchange Commission has put out its request for information to help it decide whether to impose a uniform standard of care on both investment advisers and broker-dealers that give advice to retail customers. The comment period ends 120 days after the data request, which was issued on…
The U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York is refusing to throw out the shareholder securities fraud lawsuit filed against Deutsche Bank (DB) and three individuals over their alleged role in marketing residential mortgage-backed securities and mortgage-backed securities before the economic crisis. The court found that the…
According to the Securities and Exchange Commission Office of Compliance Inspections and Examinations, it discovered “significant deficiencies” related to custody issues with a third of the investment advisers that it examined, including: • Failure of an investment adviser to recognize when it has custody • Failure to satisfy the rule’s…
According to Securities and Exchange Commission Chairman Elisse Walter, the best way to regulate global over-the-counter derivatives regulation is via “substituted compliance.” Such an approach would let a market participant comply with domestic requirements in a certain area through compliance with comparable foreign regulation while also allowing the domestic regulator…
Rajarengan “Rengan”, the brother of Galleon Group founder Raj Rajaratnam, has entered a not guilty plea to federal fraud charges accusing him of securities fraud and conspiracy to commit securities fraud. The indictment stems from the same insider trading that landed Raj behind bars for 11 years and resulted in…
Deutsche Bank Securities Inc. has consented to pay $17.5 million to the state of Massachusetts to settle allegations by that it did not disclose conflicts of interest involving collateralized debt obligation-related activities leading up to the financial crisis. Secretary of the Commonwealth William Galvin also is accusing the firm of…