Enforcement

Citigroup Global Markets, Inc. has agreed to pay a $250,000 fine after the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority found rule violations including the failure to report accurate interest rate reset information for 251,507 variable rate demand obligation securities.

The Internal Revenue Service has determined that District of Columbia’s PILOT revenue bonds are taxable.

Moody’s Investors Service withdrew its credit rating for the Town of Ramapo, N.Y. after it failed to provide audited financial statements for the 2015 fiscal year.

Phoenix-based Lawson Financial Corp. had its Financial Industry Regulatory Authority membership revoked and its CEO and president was barred from the industry after FINRA found they fraudulently sold millions of dollars of municipal revenue bonds.

Two Puerto Rico residents are firing back at UBS, saying the firm's challenge in federal court of an $18 million Financial Industry Regulatory Authority arbitration award over losses in Puerto Rico bonds is "a hopeless and baseless attempt at an unwarranted do over."

Financial advisor Hilltop Securities Inc. – formerly First Southwest – has agreed to pay $16 million to settle the lawsuit Rhode Island Commerce Corp. brought in the wake of the failed 38 Studios deal.

A federal judge has denied former Miami budget director Michael Boudreaux's motion for a new trial after a jury found him guilty of securities fraud for misleading municipal bond investors, but he is still exploring options for appeal, his lawyer said.

Marc Wyatt, director of the Securities and Exchange Commission’s Office of Compliance Inspections and Examinations, plans to leave the SEC next month to return to the private sector, the commission announced on Monday.

The Securities and Exchange Commission and three defendants allegedly involved in a pay-to-play scheme to steer billions of dollars of business from a New York pension fund to certain firms have agreed to ask a federal court to stay the civil case resulting from the charges while two criminal cases moves forward.

The Securities Exchange Commission’s regulatory and enforcement workload may be slowed or stalled now that it is down to only two commissioners, one Democrat and one Republican, said observers.