An Ecuadorian businessman settled DOJ charges of bribing then-public officials of Ecuadorian state-owned oil company Empresa Pública de Hidrocarburos del Ecuador.
The CFTC's Market Participants Division and Division of Market Oversight extended previously granted no-action relief aimed at ensuring regulatory continuity after the United Kingdom's departure from the European Union.
Several trade groups expressed support for CFTC-proposed amendments to uncleared swap margin requirements. The groups offered additional recommendations to enhance the proposals or further their intended impact.
In a 3-2 vote, the CFTC adopted a final rule that applies federal speculative position limits to 25 "core referenced futures contracts," including futures and options linked to those contracts and economically equivalent swaps.
The CFTC staff extended previously issued COVID-19-related relief through January 15, 2021 for registrants and members of swap execution facilities and designated contract markets.
CFTC staff provided additional no-action relief relating to the transition from swaps that reference London Interbank Offered Rate and other interbank offered rates.
The DOJ filed a civil forfeiture complaint alleging that North Korean cyber actors stole millions of dollars' worth of cryptocurrency and then laundered the funds through Chinese OTC cryptocurrency traders.
The CFTC's Division of Swap Dealer and Intermediary Oversight and Division of Market Oversight extended relief previously provided to registrants due to compliance challenges caused by COVID-19.
The CFTC Global Markets Advisory Committee considered subcommittee recommendations for improving the scoping and implementation of initial margin requirements for uncleared swaps.
In a working paper published by the London School of Economics, Visiting Professor David Murphy recommended improvements to regulatory review, and used the requirement of mandatory clearing of OTC derivatives as a case study.
The SEC reached separate settlement agreements with two of nine defendants charged with hacking into the SEC's online Electronic Data Gathering, Analysis and Retrieval system.
In a briefing before the Energy and Environmental Market Advisory Committee, the CFTC's Market Intelligence Branch concluded that "the derivatives markets appear resilient in the face of lower liquidity and historic volatility and volume."
The Investment Adviser Association and North American Administrators Securities Association offered opposing recommendations to the SEC on its proposal to amend the definitions of "accredited investor" and "qualified institutional buyer."
On September 9, 2019, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit ruled that LinkedIn cannot stop a data analytics company from using publicly available information from LinkedIn's website.
In response to requests from the Alternative Reference Rates Committee, CFTC staff provided relief to market participants relating to the transition from swaps referencing LIBOR and other interbank offered rates.
