Seyfarth Synopsis: On April 23, 2024, the Department of Labor released its latest attempt to amend its 1975 “fiduciary rule” and seven prohibited transaction class exemptions issued between 1975 and 2020 that investment...more
On December 23, 2023, BarnBridge DAO (“BarnBridge”) and its founders, Tayler Ward and Troy Murray, agreed to settle charges with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (“SEC”). BarnBridge violated Sections5(a) and 5(c)...more
On January 23, 2024, the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority, Inc. (“FINRA”) published an update to the targeted exam it launched in November 2022, which was designed to review – for compliance with FINRA Rule 2210 – the...more
On January 16th, the IRS published Announcement 2024-4 (the “Announcement”), postponing certain reporting requirements for large crypto transactions which were set to go into effect for the 2024 tax year. Persons engaged in...more
Alternative data continues to strongly influence the decision-making of investment professionals across all areas of the investment management industry. In a testament to the rising importance of alternative data, the...more
The Hong Kong Monetary Authority (HKMA) recently announced in a circular its expected standards for the sale and distribution of green and sustainable investment products by registered institutions (RIs). This is to ensure...more
On November 20, the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) instituted a civil enforcement action against Kraken, a major U.S. cryptocurrency exchange. The SEC alleged Kraken operated as an unregistered broker, dealer,...more
A new guidance creates a regulatory framework for tokenisation of retail investment products and provision of services for tokenised financial instruments. By Simon Hawkins and Adrian Fong On 2 November 2023, the Securities...more
On October 6, 2023, Rohit Chopra, the Director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (“CFPB”), gave a speech at the Brookings Institute’s “Payments in a Digital Century” event. In his prepared remarks, Chopra frankly...more
On 14 September 2023, the European Commission published a targeted consultation and a public consultation on the implementation of Regulation (“EU”) 2019/2088 on sustainability-related disclosures in the financial services...more
The EU regulators are reviewing the Sustainable Finance Disclosure Regulation introduced in 2021, exploring the need for potential additional adjustments. On 14 September 2023, the European Commission initiated a...more
On August 31, 2023, the Canadian Securities Administrators ("CSA") announced the repeal of National Instrument 81-104 Alternative Mutual Funds (“NI 81-104”) in all jurisdictions except Québec....more
The National Institute of Standards and Technology (“NIST”), a non-regulatory governmental agency that focuses upon the technological aspects of a wide variety of products and services, mostly non-financial in nature,...more
The Sustainable Finance Disclosure Regulation (SFDR) is a European regulation that has applied directly in the EU (and EEA countries) since March 2021. The aim of the SFDR is to provide harmonised disclosure requirements,...more
The Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (“FDIC”) published its annual Risk Review this past Monday, providing an overview of banking conditions for 2022 through early 2023. The FDIC started providing Risk Reviews to the...more
♫"Summertime and the living is easy"♫ or at least we hope it is for our growing readership. Our Explainer Things team is spicing up your consumer finance news with pop culture – Dua Lipa, The Big Lebowski, The Police, and The...more
In a recent article, we observed that the Treasury and the Internal Revenue Service (“IRS”) could address the complex tax issues presented by emerging digital assets either by developing a cohesive framework for taxing these...more
The UK Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) has announced that its widely-anticipated Policy Statement in response to the Sustainable Disclosure Requirements (SDRs) and investment labels consultation will now be published in Q3...more
On March 9, the New York attorney general filed a petition in state court against a virtual currency trading platform (respondent) for allegedly failing to registeras a securities and commodities broker-dealer and falsely...more
You need to consider how you’ll report digital asset transactions on your 2022 tax returns. Tax reporting requirements for digital assets have changed yearly since 2019, when the IRS first added a question about crypto to IRS...more
On January 20, SEC Commissioner Hester M. Peirce spoke before the Digital Assets at Duke Conference discussing cryptocurrency lessons for the future. In her remarks, Peirce discussed the current state of cryptocurrency,...more
The average length of retirement is 18 years, according to the U.S. Census Bureau. And with today’s medical technology, it could last significantly longer. Thus, a major challenge is balancing the need to maintain your...more
The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) was one of the first United States regulators to provide guidance on the tax treatment of virtual currencies such as Bitcoin. Starting back in 2014 with its release of Internal Revenue...more
Cryptocurrency companies face a steadily growing number of lawsuits, adding to a list of recent headaches for their industry. That list includes steep recent declines in investment value and a high probability of new...more
Applying Michigan law, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit has held that an “Unregistered Securities Exclusion” applied to lawsuits against a financial advisor who allegedly sold an unregistered security in...more