The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) obtained a final judgment in an enforcement case it filed over eighteen months ago against Amit Dagar, a former Pfizer Inc. employee, and his close friend and business partner, Atul Bhiwapurkar, for engaging in alleged illegal insider by capitalizing on material, non-public information concerning Pfizer’s Covid-19 treatment. The Final...Read More

While it is true that brokerage firms usually prevail in enforcing promissory note and employee forgivable loan claims in FINRA arbitrations, that is not always the case.  In my years of defending financial advisors in these matters, I have found that with certain facts and key evidence, the advisor has an opportunity to vigorously oppose...Read More

The United States Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) recently secured final court judgments against five individuals who were alleged to have worked in concert to engage in illegal insider trading by capitalizing on material, nonpublic information.  Four traded on the inside information given by the fifth and then passed it on to friends and family....Read More

With over two decades of experience defending SEC insider trading investigations, and having conducted insider trading investigations when I served as Senior Counsel in the SEC’s Enforcement Division for several years, contact me if you’re facing an SEC insider trading inquiry and are looking for strategic guidance designed to avoid being charged.   My analysis of...Read More

The United States Securities and Exchange Commission has charged Carlos Sacanell for allegedly utilizing material nonpublic information to illegally trade on Oak Street Health, Inc. (Oak Street) in advance of an announcement that CVS Health Corporation, Inc. (CVS) had agreed to acquire it.  Filed in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania,...Read More

In a case involving an apparent egregious breach of public trust, the Securities and Exchange Commission levelled insider trading charges against a veteran Federal Reserve Bank of Richmond supervisor and examiner for allegedly trading stock and options in two publicly traded companies under his supervision while in possession of material nonpublic information. The SEC’s complaint...Read More

The Securities and Exchange Commission recently filed civil, insider trading charges against Robert B. Westbrook, a UK citizen, for hacking into the computer systems of five U.S. public companies to obtain their corporate earnings results and using that material, nonpublic information for his own personal gain by trading in advance of their public release.  This...Read More

Insider trading is one of the most sensationalized, highly-publicized securities violations covered in the media.  It involves trading a public company’s stock or other securities in breach of a duty while in possession of material, non-public information about the company.   Over the years, several high-profile insider trading cases have captured the public’s attention and served...Read More

The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) recently announced settled charges against Ryan Choi, a previously licensed California Investment Adviser Representative, for negligently engaging in a scheme to defraud readers of Citron Research, an online platform that identified companies as promising short sales or long investment opportunities. The complaint, filed in the United States District Court...Read More

The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) recently filed settled charges against Vy Pham, a Vietnamese citizen living in California, for the unregistered offer and sale and manipulation of two crypto securities tokens, Saitama Inu and Robo Inu. The SEC’s complaint, filed in the U. S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts, alleges among other...Read More