European Securities and Markets Authority April 2, 2012 ESMA has published an updated version of its questions and answers on the Transparency Directive, which includes new questions on third country issuers and the designation of agents for the exercise of financial rights.

The latest Advisers Act Enforcement Action -- GMB Capital Management LLC (currently known as "Clearstream Investments LLC"), GMB Capital Partners LLC, Gabriel Bitran and Marco Bitran: IA-3399, IC-30040, 33-9315, 34-66837 (released 04/20/2012).

On February 9, 2011, the Board (CFTC, FDIC, FRB, OCC, and SEC) issued its final rule to implement the provisions of section 619 of the Dodd-Frank Act that grant banking entities and nonbank financial companies supervised by the Board a period of time to conform their activities and investments with the prohibitions and restrictions imposed by that section on proprietary trading activities and on hedge fund and private equity funds activities. Subsequently, the Board received a number of requests for clarification of the manner in which this conformance period would apply to various activities

FINRA Reg. Notice 12-21 The SEC approved amendments to FINRA Rule 13201 of the Code of Arbitration Procedure for Industry Disputes (Industry Code) to provide that a dispute arising under a whistleblower statute that prohibits the use of predispute arbitration agreements is not required to be arbitrated under the Industry Code. Parties may arbitrate such a dispute only if they have agreed to arbitrate it after the dispute arose. The rule change aligns the Industry Code with statutes that invalidate predispute arbitration agreements for whistleblower disputes. The rule change also makes a

The latest Advisers Act Enforcement Action -- MidSouth Capital, Inc. and Mark D. Hill; IA-3398, IC-30038, 34-66828 (released 04/18/2012).