According to a Wall Street Journal article, California financier, Morrie Tobin provided a critical tip to the FBI about the college admissions scam (aka Operation Varsity Blues) in order to get a reduced sentence for his role in an unrelated securities fraud case.
Wedbush Securities, Inc. has agreed to settle an SEC administrative proceeding related to the firm’s failure to take action despite being aware that an employee was involved in a long-running pump-and-dump scheme.
According to the SEC, 79 investment firms, including LPL Financial, Raymond James, Oppenheimer, and Wells Fargo have agreed to return more than $125 million to investors for failing to report conflicts of interest in their sale of mutual funds.
During the IAWatch compliance event in Washington D.C. this month, SEC officials emphasized that examiners will continue to focus on how RIAs serve their senior clients.
Wells Fargo Advisors has announced that starting April 1st, the firm will provide incentives to young advisors to help them buy books of business from retiring colleagues under its new “Summit” program. As one incentive, Wells Fargo Advisors will offer financing in the amount of 100% of a retiring colleague’s T-12 revenue.
As continually emphasized by current and former SEC officials this month during the 21st Annual IA Compliance Conference, examiners will continue to review the fees that advisors are charging clients on certain investments, the adequacy of their fee disclosures, and how their investment choices impact investors’ bottom lines.
In May of 2017, FINRA barred former Ameriprise Financial broker, Jim Jinkook Seol of Lake Forest, California for participating in $100 million worth of private securities transactions by selling away and deliberately concealing the misconduct from Ameriprise Financial.
In 2018, FINRA fined broker-dealers a total of $68 million, which was a 5% increase from $65 million in 2017, while the average fine per case increased in 2018 to $107,000 from only $65,000 in 2017.
FINRA has barred former MML Investor Services, LLC broker, Floyd Powell for failing to disclose to his firm that he sold unregistered promissory notes to 11 customers and received $104,000 in commissions as a result of the transactions.
Ex-investment adviser Shayne Kniss of Lake Oswego, Oregon has been sentenced to three years in prison after pleading guilty last year to one count of wire fraud in connection with operating a $4.3 million fraud scheme.
