Regulatory Actions and Updates from Around the Globe

Enforcement Highlights – February 2021

United States: 

• The U.S. Securities and Exchanges Commission (SEC) suspended trading in the securities of 15 companies due to questionable trading and social media activity targeted at artificially inflating their stock price.

• The SEC charged an Oklahoma-based gas exploration and production company, Gulfport Energy Corporation, and its former CEO Moore, for failing to properly disclose executive perks and related person transactions.

• The SEC charged three individuals with running a Ponzi-like scheme that raised over $1.7 billion from 17,000 retail investors through securities issued by a New York-based registered investment adviser GPB Capital.

• FINRA fined Atlanta-based investment firm Triad Advisors $200,000 over findings that it neglected to follow proper compliance procedures when switching customers’ investments between funds.

• The SEC’s initial fine of $5 million on two Ukrainian traders and their firm for defrauding investors was increased to $7.5 million in February 2021 by a U.S. Supreme Court judge.

• OFAC fined BitPay, Inc., a digital currency company based in Georgia, more than $500,000 for over 2,100 international sanctions violations from multiple digital currency transactions.

United Kingdom:

• FCA began criminal proceedings against two brothers, former Goldman Sachs and Clifford Chance employees, for fraud by false representation and insider trading.

Hong Kong:

• The Securities and Futures Commission (SFC) reprimanded Brilliance Asset Management Limited and fined it $3.15M over failures to ensure short position reports (SPRs) for four collective investment schemes.

• SFC prohibited 13 brokers from dealing with assets held in 54 trading accounts related to a suspected social media ramp-and-dump scam involving the manipulation of the market

Regulatory Updates

Singapore:

The Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) recently published its Technology Risk Management Guidelines with a focus on establishing robust governance to ensure cyber resilience and sound technology risk practices for those companies operating both inside and outside of Singapore.

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