Financial Firms

Citigroup Settles Mortgage-Backed Securities Probe with DOJ for $7 Billion

Published on: July 14, 2014 | by Shepherd Smith Edwards & Kantas, LLP

Citigroup (C) has reached a $7 billion settlement with the U.S. Department of Justice over allegations it misled investors about mortgage-backed securities in the time leading up to the 2008 financial meltdown. The settlement includes a $4 billion penalty to be paid to DOJ, $2.5 billion in consumer relief, and $500 million to a number of states and the Federal Deposit Insurance Group.

According to the U.S. government, Citigroup knew it was selling mortgage-backed securities with loans that had “material defects” and hid this information from investors. Attorney General Holder called this misconduct “egregious.” He said the bank played a role in spurring the economic crisis.

The government released a statement of fact to which Citibank consented. In it are details about how the bank ignored its own warning signs that certain mortgages were subpar and made misrepresentations about the loans that were securitized. One U.S. attorney told The Wall Street Journal that the DOJ discovered 45 mortgage-backed security deals between 2006 and 2007 where inaccuracies about underlying loans’ and their quality were made.

Deutsche Bank, Wells Fargo, Citigroup Sued by Pimco and Blackrock Over Trustee Roles Involving Mortgage Bonds

Published on: July 3, 2014 | by Shepherd Smith Edwards & Kantas, LLP

Pacific Investment Management Co. and BlackRock Inc. (BLK) are leading a group of investors, including Charles Schwab Co. (SCHW), Prudential Financial Inc. (PRU), DZ Bank AG, and Aegon in suing trust banks for losses they sustained related to over 2,000 mortgage bonds that were issued between 2004 and 2008. Defendants include units of US Bancorp (USB), Deutsche Bank AG (DBK), Wells Fargo (WFC), HSBC Holdings (HSBA.LN), Citigroup (C), and Bank of New York Mellon Corp (BK).

The investors are accusing the banks of breaching their duty as trustee when they did not force bond issuers and lenders to buy back loans that did not meet the standards that buyers were told the bonds possessed. It is a trustee’s job to make sure that principal payments and interest go to bond investors. They also need to make sure that mortgage servicing firms are abiding by the rules that oversee defective loans or homeowner defaults.

Trustees, however, have said that their duties are restricted to tasks like supervising the way payments are made to investors and giving regular reports about bond servicing. They disagree about having a wider oversight duty to fulfill.

US Supreme Court Will Hear Appeal Over Libor Antitrust Claims

Published on: July 2, 2014 | by Shepherd Smith Edwards & Kantas, LLP

The United States Supreme Court has agreed to hear an appeal in Ellen Gelboim et al v. Bank of America Corp. The lawsuit was filed by bond investors who lost money in securities tied to the London Interbank Offered Rate and the manipulation of the global benchmark interest rate. Now, the nation’s highest court is granting their request to let their claims go forward and will hold oral arguments on the lawsuit during its next term.

For the last three years, different kinds of investors have filed numerous securities fraud cases against the largest banks in the world claiming that they manipulated Libor. Last year, a district court judge allowed investors to pursue certain claims but threw out their antitrust claims.

Judge Naomi Reice Buchwald said that the settling of Libor was not competitive but, rather, cooperative; it involved banks providing data to a trade group that established the rate. Plaintiffs therefore could not prove that anticompetitive behavior harmed them.

Broker Fraud: Ex-Investors Capital Rep. is Indicted in Ponzi Scheme, Credit Suisse Sues Two Ex-Brokers Over Client Data Theft, and SEC Files More Insider Trading in IBM-SPSS Acquisition

Published on: July 1, 2014 | by Shepherd Smith Edwards & Kantas, LLP

Ex-Investors Capital Rep. Charged in $2.5M Ponzi Scam

Patricia S. Miller, a former Investors Capital Corp. representative, has been indicted on charges that she ran a $2.5 million investment fraud. She is accused of promising clients high yields for placing funds in “investment clubs.” Miller allegedly took this money and either gambled it away or used it to pay for her own spending.

According to prosecutors in Massachusetts, alleged fraud took place from 2002 through May 2014. Investors Capital fired Miller last month. Her BrokerCheck Report notes that the independent broker-dealer let her go because she allegedly misappropriated funds, borrowed client money, generated false documents, and engaged in “fraudulent investment activity.” Miller is charged with five counts of wire fraud.

Goldman Sachs Execution & Clearing Ordered to Pay $800K FINRA Fine for Not Preventing Trade-Throughs in its Dark Pool

Published on: July 1, 2014 | by Shepherd Smith Edwards & Kantas, LLP

FINRA is fining Goldman Sachs Execution & Clearing, L.P. (GS) $800,000. The self-regulatory organization says that for almost three years the firm did not have written procedures and policies that were reasonably designed enough to keep trade-throughs of protected quotations in National Market System stocks from taking place through its SIGMA-X dark pool. As a result, over an 11-day period in 2011, almost 400,000 trades were carried out at SIGMA-X through a quotation that was protected with a price that was lower than the NBBO.

Trading centers are supposed to either direct orders to trading centers with the best price quotes or trade at the prices that are the best quotes. The SRO says that the firm did not know this was happening in part because latencies in market information at Goldman’s dark pool were not detected soon enough.

Goldman Sachs has already given back $1.67M to customers who were disadvantaged. By settling, the firm is not denying or admitting to the FINRA charges. However, it agreed to the entry of the SRO’s findings.

NY Sues Barclays Over Alleged High Speed Trading Favors in Dark Pool

Published on: June 26, 2014 | by Shepherd Smith Edwards & Kantas, LLP

New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman has filed a securities fraud lawsuit against Barclays (BARC) Plc. accusing the British bank of lying about giving preference to high-frequency traders. The state contends that Barclays took part in fraudulent activity related to a dark pool. The British-based bank has 20 days to respond to the securities fraud charges.

Financial Industry Regulatory Authority data says that for the first week of June 2014, LX was the number two biggest alternative trading system in the United States. According to the high frequency trading case, LX, which is Barclays’ dark pool, favors computer-driven firms that can weave their way through the market at super fast speeds yet downplays how much these high-frequency traders use the venue.

Schneiderman says that the bank falsely depicted the way it routes the orders of clients and claimed to protect them from high-speed firms, when really the dark pool was run to the advantage of these traders. He claims that Barclays even specifically sought to bring in high-speed traders to LX, giving them preferential treatment over others by providing them with details about the way the dark pool is run.

FINRA Arbitration Panel Orders Stifel Nicolaus to Pay $2.7M to Ex-Head Trader

Published on: June 24, 2014 | by Shepherd Smith Edwards & Kantas, LLP

A Financial Industry Arbitration Panel says that Stifel Financial Corp. (SF), the brokerage unit of Stifel Nicolaus, must pay $2.7 million to, Sean Horrigan. Stifel’s ex-head trader claims that the brokerage firm defamed him and withheld his bonus without just cause. Now, the panel is holding the broker-dealer liable.

Horrigan was fired from Stifel in 2012. According to his lawyer, his termination happened several weeks after he overheard a phone call in which a manager insulted his wife to a salesperson. Horrigan’s wife was also employed at Stifel at the time. After the incident, he reacted emotionally. It was after trading hours. The firm then demoted him before letting him go just weeks prior to giving him his bonus for 2011.

Stifel contended that Horrigan was not entitled to get that money because on the day that the bonuses were issued he no longer worked for the firm. His attorney, however, says that unless an industry professional signs a contract mandating that an employee has to be employed on bonus payout day, he/she is still entitled to that money.

UBS AG Under Criminal Investigation Over Puerto Rico Bond Fund Sales

Published on: June 21, 2014 | by Shepherd Smith Edwards & Kantas, LLP

Authorities in the United States are reportedly investigating UBS AG (UBSN) for its actions in Puerto Rico. The criminal fraud investigation comes in the wake of allegations that an ex-UBS broker in Puerto Rico told clients to improperly borrow money to purchase local mutual funds that later sank.

The investigation is centered around non-purpose loans that came from UBS Bank USA of Utah. The former UBS broker, Jose Ramirez, organized the loans for clients. The bank has since let him go.

Under internal guidelines, such loans are not allowed to be used for the purchase of securities since those very securities will be the collateral for the loans. Now, however, investors are saying that Ramirez was utilizing these loans to purchase more shares in the bond funds for them. Some are even saying that he gave them paperwork that made it appear as if customers were borrowing from the UBS bank in Puerto Rico and not the one in Utah. More than 100 investors may have been affected.

Bank of America Must Face SEC and Department of Justice RMBS Fraud Lawsuits, Seeks Meeting with US Attorney General

Published on: June 21, 2014 | by Shepherd Smith Edwards & Kantas, LLP

In North Carolina, U.S. District Judge Max O. Cogburn Jr. said that Bank of America Corp. (BAC) would have to face government two residential mortgage-backed securities lawsuits. The Securities and Exchange Commission and the Department of Justice contend that the bank misled investors about the quality of loans tied to $850 million in RMBS.

Bank of America wanted the cases dismissed. It argued that the investors, both financial institutions, never sued the bank.

Judge Cogburn, however, found that the SEC’s lawsuit properly laid out that the bank lied about the mortgages’ projected health in its RMBS fraud case. With the DOJ’s case, he gave the department 30 days to revise its securities lawsuit. He found that the Justice Department did not properly state its argument, which was that bank documents included false statements while leaving out key facts.

DOJ Investigates Foreign-Exchange Industry Over Sales Markups

Published on: June 19, 2014 | by Shepherd Smith Edwards & Kantas, LLP

According to Bloomberg News, the U.S. Department of Justice is expanding its probe of the foreign-exchange industry by talking to the salespersons at the biggest banks in the world. They want to know about current sales practices, including how much customers are charged to exchange currency.

Over a dozen ex- and current traders and salespersons that were interviewed said that it is common to charge a hard markup, which factors in a slight margin for the services of a salesperson. Clients who don’t make currency deals too often or just in small quantities often don’t pay much attention to the rate they receive. Now, the DOJ wants to know if banks are committing fraud when they don’t properly disclose this practice to customers.

The Justice Department is just one of over a dozen authorities in the world that are probing the currency Now, banks are also conducting their own investigations in an attempt to negotiate for leniency just in case any disciplinary actions result.