Nonprofit Basics: Conflict of Interest Policies and Best Practices for Approving Insider Compensation
Nonprofit Basics: Insider Transactions and Nonprofits – What’s the Big Deal?
Conflicts of Interest in Healthcare and Elsewhere
Payment for Order Flow (PFOF) and Gamification: Your Questions Answered
Bar Exam Toolbox Podcast Episode 124: Listen and Learn -- Duty of Loyalty (Corporations)
Law School Toolbox Podcast Episode 282: Listen and Learn -- Duty of Loyalty (Corporations)
What to Do When Your University, FBI, or DOJ Knocks on Your Door: Responding to University, Criminal, and Civil Investigations
Videocast: Asset management regulation in 2020 videocast series – The ADV season
Videocast: Asset management regulation in 2020 videocast series – DOL: What’s ahead
Podcast: Credit Funds: Compliance Considerations for Valuation
CONVERGE18-Preview Podcasts-David Bunker on COIs in the Gig Economy
Podcast - Credit Funds: A Framework for Addressing and Mitigating Conflicts of Interest
Day 7 of One Month to Better Investigations and Report-How Investigations Inform Remediation
Day 15 of One Month to Better Compliance Through HR-Employment Separation Issues
Bill Beutler on Editing Wikipedia
Rules for rewarding 'super' condo board members
Bill on Bankruptcy: US Airways Need a Merger More than AMR
Following previous failed attempts to expand the fiduciary liability of financial services providers, the DOL released a new rule that broadens the definition of “fiduciary” under ERISA. The new rule is expected to face...more
The Department of Labor (“DOL”) on October 31, 2023—Halloween—issued a release (the “Release”) proposing to make changes to the 1975 rule (the “1975 Rule”) defining when institutions and individuals are providing fiduciary...more
On October 31, 2023, the Department of Labor published a new proposed regulation (the “Proposed Rule”) defining “investment advice” for purposes of determining when someone advising an ERISA plan or participant or an IRA...more
Registered investment advisers, including dual registrant broker-dealers (collectively “advisers”) who provide discretionary investment management services to individual retirement accounts (IRAs), are fiduciaries under the...more
The DOL’s prohibited transaction exemption (PTE) 2020-02 (Improving Investment Advice for Workers & Retirees), allows broker-dealers and their registered representatives (advisors) to receive conflicted compensation resulting...more
The DOL has issued FAQs that generally explain PTE 2020-02 and the expanded definition of fiduciary advice. In FAQ 17, the DOL discusses both the implications of payout grids and mitigation techniques to minimize...more
It may be a New Year, but 2022 is going to seem very familiar to Broker-Dealers (BD) and their Registered Representatives who advise retirement plans and IRAs: they are going to be spending a lot of time working to comply...more
The Department of Labor’s “Fiduciary Rule,” PTE 2020-02: The FAQs - Key Takeaways - ◾ The DOL has issued FAQs that generally explain PTE 2020-02 and the expanded definition of fiduciary advice. ◾ In FAQ 16, the DOL...more
On October 25, 2021, the Department of Labor (“DOL”) released Field Assistance Bulletin 2021-02 (FAB 2021-02), which extends its non-enforcement policies regarding certain rules applicable to fiduciaries who provide...more
Overview: In general, the prohibited transaction rules (in ERISA and the Tax Code) (1) prohibit fiduciaries that provide investment advice to plans subject to Title I of ERISA (including 401(k) plans, pension plans and...more
The Department of Labor’s “Fiduciary Rule”, PTE 2020-02 (Part 11): The Requirement that Investment Advisers and Broker-Dealers Mitigate Conflicts - On February 16, 2021, the DOL’s prohibited transaction exemption (PTE)...more
The US Department of Labor’s (DOL) new interpretation that rollover advice may be fiduciary “investment advice” for purposes of the Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974, as amended (ERISA), will compel companies...more
From 1996-2020, the US Department of Labor granted more than 1,200 individual exemptons from the ERISA prohibited transaction rules. One of the distinctive features of ERISA is its prohibition, in ERISA section 406 as a...more
On June 29, 2020, the U.S. Department of Labor (the Department) formally reinstated its “five-part test” for determining what constitutes “investment advice” under ERISA and Section 4975 of the Internal Revenue Code (the...more
DOL Proposes New Prohibited Transaction Exemption Allowing for Broader Investment Advice Using "Impartial Conduct Standards" and Formally Reinstates 1975 Five-Part Test for Status as an Investment-Advice Fiduciary. ...more
Regulation Best Interest: Rollover Recommendations for Investment Advisers (Rollovers Part 5) - The SEC has issued its final Regulation Best Interest (Reg BI), Form CRS Rule, RIA Interpretation and Solely Incidental...more
Regulation Best Interest: Rollover Recommendations for Investment Advisers (Rollovers Part 4)- The SEC has issued its final Regulation Best Interest (Reg BI), Form CRS Rule, RIA Interpretation and Solely Incidental...more
On June 5, 2019, the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) adopted Regulation Best Interest (Rule 15l-1 under the Securities Exchange Act of 1934 (Exchange Act)), which requires broker-dealers and their associated persons...more
On June 5, 2019, the Securities and Exchange Commission (“SEC”) voted to adopt “Regulation Best Interest,” which is intended to increase the duties a broker-dealer owes to its clients. While SEC-registered investment advisors...more
On June 5, 2019, the SEC adopted a package of rules and interpretations (the Adopted Rules) to clarify and further articulate the relationship between retail investors and their broker-dealers or investment advisers....more
It was the Ides of March for the Obama Administration’s “fiduciary duty rule” that sought to remake much of nation’s financial markets by back-door regulation of anyone dealing with IRA investors. The US Fifth Circuit...more
For the past several months, we have written about potential litigation issues under the “revised temporary” DOL Rule involving the offer and sale of annuities in the IRA market. This article continues that discussion. ...more
Since its original release as a proposed rule in April 2015 and as a final rule a year later, the Department of Labor’s (DOL's) so-called fiduciary rule — which expands the “investment advice fiduciary” definition under the...more
On November 27, 2017, the U.S. Department of Labor (DOL) extended the transition period for its conflict of interest regulation (commonly referred to as the "fiduciary rule") until July 1, 2019....more
For the past several months, we have written about potential litigation issues under the “revised temporary” DOL Rule involving the offer and sale of annuities in the IRA market. This article continues that discussion. Recall...more