In recent years, one of the favored responses of legislative reformers and regulatory enforcement authorities to financial fraud and other corporate misconduct has been the encouragement of whistleblowing activity. Both the Sarbanes-Oxley and the Dodd-Frank Act contained elaborate provisions designed to encourage and even to reward whistleblowers. There seems to be no question that the
Politics and SEC Enforcement
A number of factors might be supposed to affect the SEC’s exercise of its judgment in deciding which firms to investigate. Some possibilities that immediately come to mind are the nature and seriousness of the suspected problem; the way the problem came to the agency’s attention; and the availability of resources to investigate the problem.
India’s Securities Regulator Imposes Massive Penalties on Satyam’s Founder and Other Executives
On July 16, 2014, India’s securities regulator, the Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI), entered an order (here) against the founder and former executives of Satyam Computer Services to disgorge over $306 million in allegedly ill-gotten gains from their role in the scheme to falsify the company’s financial statements, as well as
Will Obstacles Deter the SEC’s Dodd-Frank Whistleblower Program?
Whistleblower information may be one of the SEC’s “most effective weapons in its new enforcement arsenal,” but the agency’s whistleblower program “faces challenges on many fronts,” according to an April 23, 2013 New York Times Dealbook article entitled “Hazy Future for Thriving S.E.C. Whistle-Blower Effort” (here). As evidence of the whistleblower program’s promise
SEC Brings Securities Enforcement Action Against Private Company, Former Chairman/CEO
The SEC has commenced an enforcement action against a private company and its former Chairman and CEO in connection with the company’s repurchase of company shares from company employees and others prior to the company’s acquisition.
The action involves Stiefel Laboratories, which prior to its April 2009 acquisition by GlaxoSmithKline for $68,000 a share
Corporate Penalties and the SEC
The SEC first acquired the right to impose civil penalties against corporations in the Securities Enforcement Remedies and Penny Stock Reform Act of 1990. Since the Remedies Act was enacted, the SEC has struggled with the question of when it is appropriate to obtain money penalties from corporate issuers.
In January 2006, in