In their latest announcement, the SEC has awarded $10 million to a whistleblower who provided considerable assistance that led to a successful enforcement action. The whistleblower met with SEC staff twice and brought them significant information. The charges in the enforcement action were closely aligned with the whistleblower’s allegations, which…
On September 26, 2022, the Federal Bureau of Investigation arrested three men for running a $100 million fraud based out of Hometown International, the corporate owner of a small New Jersey deli. According to the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), it was a classic “pump and dump” scheme. While the…
The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) announced the creation of two new offices—an Office of Crypto Assets (OCA) and an Office of Industrial Applications and Services (OIAS)—within its Division of Corporation Finance’s Disclosure Review Program (DRP). While the offices haven’t yet opened, it’s already worth understanding their significance and expected…
A lot of the initial appeal of cryptocurrency came from the idea that the crypto’s technology is a more secure, anonymous form of digital transfer. So why then do the Securities Exchange Commission (SEC) and other agencies keep warning consumers about Bitcoin-related frauds? As is commonly the case with any…
Earlier this year, rumors circulated that the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission is investigating cryptocurrency exchange Coinbase Global Inc. In July of 2022, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission began a probe into whether Coinbase improperly allowed Americans to trade digital assets that should have been registered as securities. But according to…
Twitter has been in the news quite a bit this year, and, in this case, not all publicity is good publicity. In August of 2022, the Washington Post and CNN gained access to a whistleblower report alleging mismanagement, spying, and security concerns at Twitter. The report came from Peiter “Mudge” Zatko, the…
In August, CNN published an expose detailing accusations from a whistleblower that social media giant Twitter misled its board and U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission regulators about security vulnerabilities on its platform. The news has been explosive. The whistleblower is Peiter Zatko, Twitter’s former head of security and a noted cybersecurity expert.…
The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission has recently ratcheted up enforcement of insider trading cases, announcing investigations against ten people in four different cases in July. The headline-grabbing case involves a former Coinbase manager, his brother, and a friend alleging a scheme to trade the cryptocurrency ahead of announcements that crypto assets…
We hear about securities fraud when a big case comes along. Hollywood often mythologizes the topic in movies like The Wolf of Wall Street. But these headline-grabbing stories don’t tell the full story. Companies are often under immense pressure to meet market expectations. On the Bloomberg Law podcast, UCLA Law School…
When the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) warns investors of types of investment scams—such as boiler room and Ponzi schemes—the agency routinely mentions the high-pressure aggressive sales tactics scammers rely on to help defraud their customers. So let’s look at some techniques that fraudsters are using: It’s A Once-In-A-Lifetime Offer!…