The Securities and Exchange Commission has issued an order raising the threshold for determining whether an investment adviser can charge performance fees to clients. The increase is because of inflation. It also executes a Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act requirement. Under the Investment Adviser Act’s Rule 205-3,…
Following SEC charges that they used material misrepresentations and omissions to misappropriate about $8.7 million from clients, family, and friends, Sam Otto Folin, Benchmark Asset Managers LLC and Harvest Managers, LLC have agreed to pay $11.6M in disgorgement, civil penalties, and prejudgment interests to settle the securities fraud allegations. By…
According to Ex-Texas State Securities Board Denise Voigt Crawford, giving oversight of nearly 12,000 investment advisers to the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority to cut costs is a bad idea and one for which investors will end up paying the price. FINRA is Wall Street’s self-funded regulator. Already charged with overseeing…
The Securities and Exchange Commission says it will raise the dollar thresholds that would need to be met before an investment adviser can charge a client a performance fee. The monetary thresholds are related to two tests under the 1940 Investment Advisers Act that let investment advisers charge performance-based fees…
Securities and Exchange Commission’s Office of Compliance Inspections and Examinations deputy director Norm Champ says that when preparing to be examined, investment advisers should look at recent SEC enforcement actions stemming from problems found during previous exams at other advisers. Champ made this suggestion last month at an American Law…
Florida’s Office of Financial Regulation’s securities director Frank Widman says Congress should ignore calls for a new SRO to help the Securities and Exchange Commission oversee any investment advisers. Widmann spoke last month at the North American Securities Administrators Association’s public policy conference in DC. Widmann, who previously served as…
Financial Industry Regulatory Authority CEO and Chairman Richard Ketchum says that if the SRO is chosen to regulate investment advisers, it will tailor its oversight to that industry. At a compliance conference run by the Financial Market Association and the Securities Industry last month, Ketchum said that advisers’ concerns that…
Earlier this month, the members of the Securities and Exchange Commission’s Division of Investment Management recommended that Congress either set up at least one self-regulatory organization that oversees investment advisers, impose “user fees” to fund examinations by the Office of Compliance Inspections and Examinations, or make investment adviser oversight the…
The US Securities and Exchange Commission has adopted amendments to delay the expiration date of Rule 206(3)-3T under the 1940 Investment Advisers Act. The temporary rule, which was supposed to expire on December 31, 2010, will now stay in effect until December 31, 2012. Rule 206(3)-3T gives investment advisers that…
The Financial Services Institute wants the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority to be the main watchdog over registered investment advisers. FSI, which represents 126 broker-dealers’ interests, endorsed FINRA in a letter to the Securities and Exchange Commission. Many of the broker-dealers that FSI represents are also RIAs. FSI believes that not…