Workforce Bulletin

On August 20, 2019, the Securities and Exchange Commission (“SEC”) charged Mosaic Capital, LLC, formerly known as AOC Securities, LLC (“AOC”), and its CEO with failing to adequately supervise an employee who engaged in securities fraud.  Pursuant to the SEC Orders, AOC and its CEO were ordered to pay penalties of $250,000 and $40,000, respectively.  The SEC’s actions serve as a reminder to broker-dealers—and members of firm management—of the potential for liability based on the actions of a self-dealing employee, and the need to guard against such activities.

The ...

On September 10, 2015, the Second Circuit Court of Appeals ruled in Berman v. Neo@Ogilvy LLC that an employee who reports an alleged securities violation only to his or her employer, and not to the SEC, is nevertheless covered by the anti-retaliation protections afforded by the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act of 2010 (“Dodd-Frank”).

Berman, a former finance director of Neo@Ogilvy, claimed that his employer and its corporate parent, WPP Group USA, Inc., violated the whistleblower protections of Dodd-Frank by wrongfully terminating him for raising ...

Michelle Capezza, our colleague at Epstein Becker Green, recently posted a useful summary of the JOBS Act, and we recommend it to our readers in the financial services industry.  See below for an excerpt and link.

On April 5, 2012, President Obama signed into law the Jumpstart Our Business Startups Act, or JOBS Act.  In light of the sharp decline in the number of companies entering the U.S. capital markets through IPOs over the last ten years, Congress recognized a need for this legislation since small companies are critical to economic growth and job creation.  To promote growth and ...