Amit Shah

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This week, the CFTC approved a NFA Interpretative Notice that prohibits a Member from accepting credit card payments from customers to fund retail forex accounts.  The NFA recently reviewed how customers fund their retail forex accounts and found that customers overwhelmingly funded their trading accounts using a credit card.  The NFA noted that credit cards…

The Dodd-Frank Act directed the SEC to study whether broker-dealers should be held to a fiduciary duty standard rather than the lower “suitability” standard.  Advocates for the fiduciary standard claim that customers are often under the misconception that they are dealing with a professional obligated to put their interests first.  Many broker-dealers have argued that…

In the wake of several high profile failures of futures market participants, the NFA and others recently completed a study of how customer asset protection insurance (“CAPI”) would work in the futures industry.  The CAPI program would provide additional customer asset protection and limit the risk of loss to customers.  The study found that insurers…

SEC Chairman Mary Jo White recently stated at a Senate Banking Committee hearing that the SEC was examining whether the insider trading rules should be expanded to include the commodities markets.  White’s statements were made in response to questioning about the role of several large banks in the commodities market.  Insider trading is enforced in…

Much to the disappointment of brokers, the SEC recently approved a proposed rule that allows FINRA to publicly release copies of any disciplinary complaint or decision it issues, including the names of the parties involved.  Prior to approval of the rule, complaints appeared in summary format on FINRA’s BrokerCheck web portal.  Now, unredacted complaints will…

For decades, the SEC allowed defendants to enter into a settlement agreements where they neither admitted nor denied any alleged wrongdoing.  However, in response to political pressure from Senator Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass), who asked the SEC whether the SEC’s neither-admit-nor-deny settlement policy should be changed to better make use of the SEC’s leverage in the…

This has been the week of scandals.  With political forces, lobbyist and lots of deep pockets, our government is a breeding ground for scandals.  The SEC has certainly not been immune.  A few years ago, the SEC made headlines because several of its employees were watching pornography during working hours.  Recently, the former chief inspector…

I do not envy any attorney who attempts plead a Section 10b-5 claim.  Courts throughout the country have made pleading scienter extremely difficult, and the benefit of any doubt favors the defendants.  Under the PSLRA, a plaintiff must plead a strong interference of scienter by alleging sufficient facts to show that the defendant had both…

A magistrate judge in the Northern District of Illinois recently ruled that Section 15(a) of the Exchange Act does not apply extraterritorially even if a foreign transaction was facilitated by a broker-dealer in the United States.  In the case, unregistered broker-dealers conducted a foreign stock transaction on a foreign exchange from the United States.  The…

Over the last several years, Congress and industry insiders have discussed whether it is time to merge the SEC and CFTC.  After some high-profile regulatory lapses by both agencies, Congressional studies indicated that the lapses were due, in part, to the lack of coordination and failure to share information between the agencies.  In late 2012…