This case serves as a tough reminder for non-U.S. financial organizations that they must impose procedures to prevent themselves from dealing with U.S. customers even when the choice is unintentional. Otherwise, they risk subjecting themselves to the U.S. regulatory regime.  

That said, the significant question raised by this case concerns the regulatory culture in the United States: what possible justification could there have been for levying a $140,000 fine against the foreign…

Given the uncertain requirements that are imposed on firms by the NFA's cyber guidance, attending one of the conferences and listening carefully to what the NFA says is important.

The notion that, on a widespread basis, speculation drives prices up and beyond the reasonable expectations of market participants has always seemed questionable from the standpoint of economic theory. If, because of the behavior of some speculators, prices were to rise to unreasonably high levels, then why wouldn't other speculators seek to sell into those unreasonably high prices, make a sure profit, and drive prices down? Leaving aside the generalities in that assertion, it is hard to…

The OCIE indicates that one of its areas of priority is determining whether investors' assets are being put into accounts that are charged on the basis of assets under management rather than trading volume. It should be clear that the effect of the regulators' drive to impose a "fiduciary" obligation on broker-dealers providing recommendations will be to motivate broker-dealers to move clients into accounts charging asset-backed fees. After all, an account that pays only …