Lynn Tilton and her firm, Patriarch Partners, are known for their high-risk, high-return investments in distressed companies. The Securities and Exchange Commission brought a case against her and the firm claiming that they were using improper valuations, failing to mark down assets when the investment became more distressed. At this point we only have the … Read more »
Category: SEC News
Drew Bowden Thinks Private Equity is a Great Business
“I tell my son, I have a teenaged son, I tell him, ‘Cole, you want to be in private equity. That’s where to go, that’s a great business, that’s a really good business. That’ll be good for you.’” – Andrew Bowden Mr. Bowden, Director of the Securities and Exchange Commission’s Office of Compliance Inspections and … Read more »
Getting Caught With IPO Fever
A decade ago shares in an initial public offering were handed out as gifts to curry favor with business executives. The shares were all but guaranteed to pop on the opening day for an easy gain. The recent Twitter IPO had that similar feeling of a guaranteed pop. Gregory Gray thought he could make some … Read more »
Fighting Against the SEC’s Administrative Hearings
Prior to the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act, the Securities and Exchange Commission’s authority to impose penalties in a case brought as an administrative proceeding was restricted to regulated entities. The SEC could not impose a significant civil penalty in an administrative proceeding. That limited administrative proceedings to cease-and-desist proceedings against broker-dealers, … Read more »
Failing to Disclose Fees
The Securities and Exchange Commission has been focused on fees charged by investment advisers and fund managers. The latest target is Robare Group Ltd. based in Houston. The SEC alleges that the firm was receiving a fee from certain investments made for its clients but failed to properly disclose that it was receiving the fee. … Read more »
SEC’s Municipal Advisor Exam Initiative
The Securities and Exchange Commission announced a new examination initiative directed at newly regulated municipal advisors. The examinations are designed to establish a “presence” with the newly regulated municipal advisors. We’ve seen this blueprint before. It looks a lot like the presence exam initiative for newly registered private fund managers and the never before examined … Read more »
The SEC Shows Some Respect for the Working Woman
The Securities and Exchange Commission decided to emphasize that working wives can be a source of material non-public information. The SEC press release highlighted insider trading cases brought against husbands who engaged in insider trading after learning confidential information from their wives. The first case was against Tyrone Hawk. His wife worked at Oracle. Mr. … Read more »
Do U.S. Regulators Listen to the Public?
Regulators get piles of comment letters on proposed rules. But do the comments have an affect? Three math and finance professors tried analyzed the text of comments and regulations to find and answer. Andrei A. Kirilenko, Shawn Mankad, and George Michailidis created a regulatory analytical tool called RegRank. The three researchers pointed RegRank at the … Read more »
Are SEC Employees Profiting from Enforcement Actions?
Emory University accounting professor Shivaram Rajgopal points an accusatory finger at Securities and Exchange Commission employees and proclaims a pattern of selling stocks of companies subject to enforcement actions. His study finds “significant abnormal returns of (i) about 4% per year for all securities in general; and (ii) about 8.5% in U.S. common stocks in … Read more »
Private Fund Theft Through Diligence Payments
The Securities and Exchange Commission charged Lawrence E. Penn III and his firm Camelot Acquisitions Secondary Opportunities Management, a private equity manager, with stealing $9 million from investors in their private equity fund. He is accused of siphoning off $9.3 million through sham due diligence payments. The SEC claims that Penn used a shell company … Read more »