Political tribalism overrules common sense, even on bank regulation With the 10th anniversary of Bear Stearns' collapse coming up this week, leave it to Congress to find the perfect way to mark the occasion — by voting for another financial crisis. This effectively is what the Senate risked late Wednesday in approving, by a vote of 67 to 31, a revision of the Dodd-Frank financial reform law that weakens federal oversight of banks with up to $250 billion in assets.
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Who is Haim Bodek? Haim was the first whistleblower to expose how a major stock exchange (Direct Edge) created an order type (Hide Not Slide) that provided HFT firms with unfair advantages that propelled them to the exchanges' best prices at investors' expense. Back in 2012, the financial media was all over this story and market structure savvy journalists like Scott Patterson were able to shine a light on these shady exchange practices. Scott's article "How "Hide Not Slide" Orders Work" was a virtual blueprint in how unsuspecting investors were getting ripped off by HFT traders who were armed with Direct Edge's special order type. Direct Edge was subsequently fined $14 million by the SEC for failing to properly describe order types.
Since the American civil war, the US government has relied on private whistleblowers to help it ferret out overcharging and other fraud by government contractors. Filed under the False Claims Act, these qui tam lawsuits allow individuals to sue on behalf of the federal government and then share in the proceeds if the claims hold up.
The Securities and Exchange Commission has charged a penny stock promoter based in Florida with defrauding investors in a pair of gold mining stocks by secretly amassing shares before touting the companies publicly.
Rosenberg is the fourth doctor jailed over Insys bribes following a federal probe that resulted in the indictment of billionaire founder and Chief Executive Officer John Kapoor and six other executives. The group was charged with orchestrating an elaborate scheme to bribe doctors and defraud health-care providers.
A one-time U.S. Justice Department lawyer, Wertkin came up with a plan to steal secret whistle-blower lawsuits and then sell the documents to the companies named in them because he believed his $450,000 salary at Washington's Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld LLP undervalued him, a prosecutor told the judge during a sentencing hearing in San Francisco federal court.
A former employee of a U.S. government contractor in Afghanistan pleaded guilty today to accepting illegal kickbacks from an Afghan subcontractor in return for his assistance in obtaining subcontracts on U.S. government contracts.
A former Erie cardiologist who sued his former colleagues and UPMC Hamot will receive $6 million as part of the $20.75 million settlement that Hamot reached to end the cardiologist's federal whistleblower case.
9th Circuit Court of Appeals has upheld the 2015 jury verdict awarding $1.25 million to a railroad whistleblower who claimed he was fired after reporting safety concerns.
The Securities and Exchange Commission today announced securities fraud charges against a U.K.-based broker-dealer and its investment manager in connection with manipulative trading in the securities of HD View 360 Inc., a U.S.-based microcap issuer.
A Birmingham whistleblower who uncovered and reported an illegal kickback and false billing scheme that defrauded the Alabama Organ Center and taxpayers was awarded a judgment of $14.7 million after winning a jury trial last month.
Rannazzisi was a whistleblower in a "60 Minutes"-Washington Post investigation last year. The report detailed how the drug industry used its influence in Congress and in the executive branch to take away the DEA's most potent tool for stopping drug companies suspected of allowing drugs to wind up in the wrong hands.
BMH paid more than $1.6 million to resolve the allegations that the hospital violated the federal False Claims Act and the Vermont False Claims Act.
Almost a decade after the Ponzi scheme collapsed, trustees are still returning money to the victims. When bankruptcy trustees were appointed over a hectic weekend late in 2008, there seemed no end to the losses caused by the collapse of Bernie Madoff's Ponzi scheme. Cash in the bank was no more than $150m. But the losses have been less, and the assets available for compensation greater, than had been feared.
According to the Securities and Exchange Commission, Mr. Shapiro was actually operating the company as a $1.2 billion Ponzi scheme, in which storied estates like Owlwood were a lure to draw investors.
Curious about the world's most — and least — corrupt countries? On Wednesday Transparency International, a well-known NGO devoted to global anti-corruption, released its annual scorecard. TI's Corruption Perceptions Index shows the United States now sits in 16th place (of 180 territories), with a score of 75 out of 100. That's a small improvement on the 2016 index in which the United States was 18th with a score of 74.
Why are these record awards good news for consumers and investors? First, the fact that record whistleblower awards are coming out of Washington is strong confirmation that fears our federal regulatory agencies would cease to vigorously enforce the laws are overblown at least with respect to the financial markets.
JPMorgan Chase & Co.'s failure to properly inform some rich clients about conflicts of interest has resulted in a record $30 million whistleblower award by U.S. futures regulators.
On the same day that people linked to the three politically connected Gupta brothers were granted bail by a South African court after appearing on graft charges, one of the siblings, Ajay Gupta, was declared a fugitive.
The CBOE Volatility Index, known as the VIX, has been "suspect for at least seven years," says Bart Chilton, former CFTC commissioner. The whistleblower allegation of VIX manipulation "rings true to me," Chilton says.
