Enforcement

Los Angeles Unified School District officials stand behind their disclosure after the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission opened an informal inquiry into the district’s compliance with legal guidelines in the use of bond proceeds to buy iPad tablets.

New York State and New York City comptrollers Thomas DiNapoli and Scott Stringer, respectively, called on the SEC to compel fossil fuel industry companies to better disclosure climate change material risks

The Securities and Exchange Commission has charged a New York City-based financial advisor with fraud, saying he stole at least $20 million from customers who were told their money would be invested in municipal bonds when it actually evaporated in riskier trades.

The Financial Industry Regulatory Authority fined two firms $55,000 for muni trade rule violations and suspended a former broker, as well as fined him to pay $5,000 in fines and ordered him to disgorge $2,837 of ill-gotten gains plus interest, for making unsuitable municipal securities recommendations to clients.

Two divisions of Morgan Stanley have agreed to be censured and pay $675,000 to settle Financial Industry Regulatory Authority charges that the dealers misrepresented taxable municipal bond interest paid to customers as tax-exempt.

Nine large public pension funds, including those from New York and Connecticut, have asked the SEC to strengthen the disclosure of corporate board diversity.

A federal appeals court will hear oral arguments May 15 in the case of three convicted bid riggers seeking to have their convictions overturned.

A Republican congressman said Tuesday he is concerned that the Securities and Exchange Commission's approach to municipal market enforcement risks creating an environment where only big players will get a seat at the table.

Former RBC Capital Markets managing director Mel Schonhorst achieved a measure of success after seven years trying to clear his name in a Texas investigation that cost him his job though he was never accused of anything.

Lawmakers are concerned about the Securities and Exchange Commission's extensive use of administrative proceedings to enforce securities laws in the wake of the Dodd-Frank Act, a trend that has not extended to municipal cases.

Former Miami budget director Michael Boudreaux wants the U.S. Supreme Court to grant him immunity from a Securities and Exchange Commission lawsuit that has attracted a lot of attention from issuer officials and attorneys.

A federal ruling against states may set a precedent for risky local spending on broadband, credit analysts said.

Lawyers, issuer officials, and others consulted about the fund agreed that the three firms did nothing against the rules when they gave the money to the fund, which is governed by a board independent of the city leadership and which does nothing to politically support Garcetti or any other political interest.

Securities and Exchange Commission member Daniel Gallagher is calling for Congress to mandate that municipal issuers use Government Accounting Standards Board benchmarks, possibly as a condition for the bonds to be tax-exempt.

The Missouri Joint Municipal Electric Utility Commission is selling $158 million of power refunding bonds tied to the controversial Prairie State coal plant, which recently won a round of fresh praise from ratings analysts.

Many bond lawyers feel that with all municipal rating agencies soon to be beaming live ratings to EMMA, the Securities and Exchange Commission should amend its rules so that issuers no longer have to worry about filing notices of upgrades and downgrades.

Bond lawyers are warning their issuer clients that they are operating at their own peril if they do not spend their bond proceeds in a timely fashion, since Internal Revenue Service agents in audits are raising concerns about proceeds that are spent late or not spent at all.

The Securities and Exchange Commission's enforcement division is contacting dealers who reported their own possible violations of securities laws under a voluntary enforcement program initiated last year, giving them two weeks to decide if they still want to take advantage of the lenient settlement terms.

Large financial firms can expect continued scrutiny for risk management, internal controls and governance, Federal Reserve chair Janet Yellen said in New York.

The Municipal Securities Rulemaking Board is likely to propose requiring alternative trading systems to report quotation information on municipal securities to it in the future, industry officials said after listening to speakers on a federal regulatory update panel at a conference here on Monday afternoon.