It’s been a busy week with guests in the house. I haven’t been able to publish any stories, but these are a few that caught my eye.
Finders Are Not Always Keepers! in the Word of Wisdom Blog from Latham & Watkins Capital Markets Group
Let’s start with the basics. Section 15(a) of the Exchange Act requires that persons engaged in “broker” or “dealer” activity must register with the SEC unless an exemption is available. In general, a “broker” is any person “engaged in the business of effecting transactions in securities for the account of others” and a “dealer” is any person “engaged in the business of buying and selling securities for such person’s own account.” Based on no-action guidance from the SEC Staff, activities that may be deemed (alone or in combination) to confer “broker” status include: …
Where are the Jobs in the Jobs Act? An Examination of the Uneasy Connection between Securities Disclosure and Job Creation by Ian K. Peck on SSRN:
The JOBS Act, passed in April 2012, is designed to produce American jobs through removing various regulatory barriers for small companies to access investor capital. As the regulations continue to be implemented, commentators have dissected the various ways in which the JOBS Act attempts to achieve this goal. One of the methods involves making the IPO process initially less burdensome, through scaling back financial and corporate governance disclosures. Crowdfunding, which will eventually permit companies to raise investor capital through an online “funding portal”, has garnered both deep criticism from regulators and praise from small business owners. Yet little attention has been paid to the notion that the very reason for disclosure reform is job creation. This matters because job creation has not historically played a direct role in the reform of securities disclosure statutes and regulations. This Article analyzes what role, if any, job creation should occupy in the reform of securities disclosure laws. After establishing the normative baseline for disclosure theory and reform, this Article highlights various unintended consequences of using job creation as a justification for reform and proposes a framework for understanding job creation-based disclosure reforms going forward.
(Pointed by Securities Law Prof Blog)
Odds Raised Slightly SEC Will Knock on Your Door This Year in fi360 Blog
In past years OCIE has typically focused on higher risk RIAs – those with custody or the larger complexes that pose more risk to the markets. The vast majority of adviser firms registered with the Commission, however, have 10 or fewer non-clerical employees. Over the next two years, OCIE plans to inspect 1,000 of these rarely or never-inspected RIA firms. In recent years, the SEC has inspected roughly 9 percent of all firms annually.
The fault lies not in our agencies, but in our Congresses by William Carleton
There’s nothing the SEC can do to make non-accredited crowdfunding under Title III of the JOBS Act cost-efficient. The essential problem is that Congress wrote a mini-registration law, rather than authorizing the agency to craft a crowdfunding exemption.
Image is from Vault of Roman Bath in Bath – England by Heinz-Josef Lücking
CC BY SA
