Wall Street Investment Fraud Lawyer Blog

On April 12, 2013, we posted a blog entitled In Proposal, SEC’s Budget to Oversee Investment Advisors Increased, which detailed the recent federal budget proposal that would increase the SEC’s funding by $256 million to allow the SEC to hire hundreds of examiners to increase investment advisor oversight. On April 16, 2013, however, SEC member Elisse Walter…

On April 12, 2013, FINRA announced that has filed a complaint against Success Trade Securities Inc, an online discount firm, and its CEO, Fuad Ahmed. The complaint alleges that Success Trade Securities Inc. fraudulently sold more than $18 million in promissory notes to 58 investors, most of them former professional football and basketball players. The notes…

Florida legislation, likely to be enacted Summer 2013, will make broker dealer and investment advisor branch office set-up instantaneous. A bill that would replace the current registration process with one that grants instant approval once an application is filed has been approved by the financial committees in the Florida state House and Senate. Under current…

Under the recent federal budget proposal by the President, the SEC’s funding would increase an extra $256 million allowing the SEC to hire hundreds of additional examiners to increase investment advisor oversight. Under the proposal, the SEC’s budget would rise to $1.67 billion, from $1.42 billion. The SEC wants to use part of the money to “beef…

On April 10, 2013, four top executives of DBSI Inc. were indicted by a federal grand jury in Idaho on 83 charges, including conspiracy to commit securities fraud, wire fraud, mail fraud and interstate transportation of stolen property. Allegedly, DBSI was acting like a Ponzi scheme to continue operations and pay returns to other investors. The…

With many baby boomers entering retirement every day, FINRA is increasing its focus on how financial advisory firms are selling financial products to seniors. FINRA is gathering data from firms regarding the products firms marketed to seniors, the percentage of revenue firms derived from those sales, and the designations firms are using to market themselves to…

On April 8, 2013, the SEC charged ThanhHa Bao, a former employee at Abaxis Inc. a California-based medical device manufacturer, with illegally tipping. Bao allegedly tipped confidential financial data to her brother, Tai Nguyen, who illegally traded in Abaxis Inc.’s stock and enabled his hedge fund clients, at Insight Research, to do the same. Bao worked…

On April 8, 2013, the Senate confirmed Mary Jo White as chairman of the SEC by voice vote. According to SEC spokesman John Nester, Ms. White could start in her new job as early as Tuesday, pending the completion of Senate and White House paperwork, but it’s not clear when she’ll make her first public appearance as…

Last week, U.S. District Judge Kiyo Matsumoto dismissed a class action lawsuit against David Lerner. According to a spokesman for Lerner, the federal court dismissed all of the class action’s federal securities law claims as well as the state law claims against David Lerner Associates, with prejudice. The dismissed suit alleged that Lerner’s sale of more…

On April 5, 2013, former FINRA employee Joseph Sciddurlo filed a whistle-blower suit in federal court, claiming he was fired after detecting a flaw in FINRA’s risk-rating system that allowed large broker-dealers to be over-leveraged. Sciddurlo claims in the suit that he worked as a principal examiner for FINRA and in 2010 he discovered that FINRA allowed…