The U.S. Treasury Department Office of Foreign Assets Control ("OFAC") extended the expiration date of two General Licenses related to Ukraine-related sanctions. General License 13I, which replaces General License 13H, authorizes certain transactions necessary to divest or transfer debt, equity or other holdings in certain blocked persons. As for transactions authorized by this General License pertaining to GAZ Group or entities that GAZ Group owns, the expiration date is March 7, 2019. The expiration date for transactions involving En+ Group PLC or United Company Rusal PLC remains January 21

The FDIC and Federal Reserve Board (collectively, the "agencies") found that the resolution plans (the "plans") of four foreign-based banks had "shortcomings" in how each bank communicated and coordinated between its U.S. operators and foreign parent "in stress." Separately, the agencies adopted final resolution plan "guidance for the 2019 and subsequent resolution plan submissions by the eight largest, complex U.S. banking organizations." Pursuant to the Dodd-Frank Act, resolution plans are mandated and must outline a company's strategy for a resolution under bankruptcy "in the event of

FINRA's new Report on Selected Cybersecurity Practices - 2018(the "Report") is one of FINRA's latest initiatives to help broker-dealers further enhance their cybersecurity programs. In the Report, FINRA reviewed how firms are (i) bolstering their cybersecurity controls in branch offices, (ii) limiting phishing attacks, (iii) identifying and alleviating insider threats, (iv) strengthening penetration-testing programs, and (v) creating and maintaining controls on mobile devices. FINRA observed firms instituting the following practices, among others: establishing written supervisory procedures (

The CFTC issued three related no-action letters that, taken together, permit Eurex Clearing AG ("Eurex"), a registered derivatives clearing organization ("DCO") located in Europe, to clear swap transactions on behalf of U.S. customers of futures commission merchants ("FCMs"). In CFTC Letter 18-30, the CFTC Division of Clearing and Risk ("DCR") confirmed that Eurex demonstrated its ability to comply with the straight-through processing requirements of CFTC Rule 39.12(b)(7). As a result, Eurex can begin "clearing and settling transactions on behalf of U.S. persons that are clearing members, U.S

The SEC adopted a new rule that would establish a pilot program (the "Pilot") to study the effects that transaction-based fees and rebates in certain National Market System ("NMS") stocks may have on order-routing behavior, execution quality and market quality generally. The Pilot will be applicable to all stock exchanges and will last for up to two years. According to the SEC, the Pilot will create two test groups of exchanges, with one group barred "from offering rebates and linked pricing" and the other group limited to a fee cap of $0.0010. The data from the Pilot will be utilized to