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

The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission recently filed insider trading charges against Chicago based Kevin Crotty in connection with trading in advance of a publicly released announcement on  February 16, 2023 that BP had agreed to acquire TravelCenters of America.  This SEC insider trading enforcement action marked the second civil action the SEC has brought...Read More

In September 2023, the United States Securities and Exchange Commission filed charges against nine investment advisory firms for violations of the Marketing Rules. Almost eight months later, the SEC has brought a second wave of Market Rule violations filing resolved charges against several registered investment advisory firms. Each of the targeted investment advisory firms consented...Read More

The United States Securities and Exchange Commission has secured a final judgment in federal district court against Zachary Horwitz, an individual the SEC sued for allegedly orchestrating a $690 million Ponzi scheme. The SEC’s enforcement complaint contends that Horwitz falsely represented to investors that he had a successful history of selling movie rights to two...Read More

The United States Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) recently secured a final consent judgment against Volkswagen Group of America Finance, which the SEC had previously filed securities fraud charges against in 2019 for making materially false and misleading representations relating to its billions in corporate bond offerings in 2014 and 2015. The SEC enforcement action,...Read More

The US Securities and Exchange Commission sued Andreas “Andy” Bechtolsheim, the founder of Arista Networks, Inc., alleging he engaged in illegal insider trading.  In settlement of the SEC’s enforcement action, Bechtolsheim consented to pay an approximate $1 million civil monetary penalty. Per the SEC’s federal court complaint, Bechtolsheim is alleged to have misappropriated inside information...Read More

The United States Securities and Exchange Commission has filed fraud charges, on a settled basis, in federal court against the former head of the now bankrupt automaker Lordstown Motors Corp, Stephen Scott Burns.  In its complaint, the SEC alleged that Burns materially mislead company investors regarding “pre-orders” for its electric truck called Endurance. Specifically, in...Read More

The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission filed an enforcement action against numerous individuals for their involvement in a $300 million Ponzi scheme run by CryptoFX LLC, which allegedly targeted in excess of 40,000 mainly Latino investors here in the United States, as well as in two other countries.  The SEC’s complaint follows its prior emergency...Read More