News & Events

Join leading in-house and outside counsel, regulators and experts on Thursday, January 26th in NYC for the 2017 SIFMA/Bates Group Leaders & Experts CLE Forum: "Successfully Managing Regulatory Investigations and Enforcement Matters in the Big Data Age." Registration is now open.

The SEC has released its examination priorities for 2017, which contain a continuation of many priorities from last year, as well as some new areas of focus.  Just as we did last week when we covered FINRA’s 2017 priorities, this week we will concentrate largely on new SEC initiatives, with some attention to those initiatives which are continuations of earlier priorities.

The SEC has announced their examination priorities for 2017.

Last week FINRA released its Regulatory and Examination Priorities Letter for 2017.  The letter outlined fewer priorities than in previous years, and it gives a more tangible set of marching orders than firms have received in at least two years.  We will examine the major themes of some of these changes below, rather than focusing on those aspects of the letter that are continuations of previous enforcement agendas.

FINRA has announced their regulatory and examination priorities for 2017.

Join leading in-house and outside counsel, regulators and experts on Thursday, January 26th in NYC for the 2017 SIFMA/Bates Group Leaders & Experts CLE Forum: "Successfully Managing Regulatory Investigations and Enforcement Matters in the Big Data Age." Early Bird Registration is now open.

Bates Group Managing Director David Birnbaum is quoted in an Ignites (FT's Mutual Funds industry publication) article on the compliance concerns companies need to consider during and after a merger or acquisition.  Click to read the full story.

This is the final installment in a three-part series discussing personal liability for compliance professionals. This week we will take a look at the impact this is having on the industry and the steps some CCOs are taking to minimize their personal liability.

Bates Group is proud to announce our new Experts and Consultants. Click below for more information or visit our expert search page.

This is the second installment in a three-part series discussing personal liability for compliance professionals. This week we will take a look at regulators’ perceptions of their enforcement activity and what this trend might mean for compliance professionals moving forward.

This is the first installment in a three-part series discussing personal liability for compliance professionals. This week we will look at the growing trend of regulatory enforcement activity against compliance professionals and the perception within the compliance industry of increased personal risk. 

President elect Donald Trump has promised to overhaul all aspects of Federal regulation within the United States, and as a result there has been a great deal of speculation as to what that might mean for securities regulation, oversight, and especially enforcement for the next four years.

Bates Group is pleased to announce that Andrew Daniel, Bates Group Director, Securities Litigation Expert and Consultant, will be a featured speaker at the 2016 Securities Symposium, sponsored by the Greensfelder law firm and The Bar Association of Metropolitan St. Louis, on Wednesday, November 16, 2016.

While we are still enjoying the fall weather (and now processing the post-election news), securities regulators are busy thinking about critical 2017 priorities. Regulators from the FINRA, SEC and CFTC all previewed their 2017 priorities for attendees at SIFMA’s 2016 NY Regional Conference, held last Wednesday, November 2nd, at the New York Marriott Marquis.

On October 26th, the Special Inspector General for the Troubled Asset Relief Program (“SIGTARP”), Christy Goldsmith Romero, issued her fourth quarter 2016 report in which she proposed a reform designed to “bring accountability” to high-level executives by requiring a crime and fraud certification that is modeled after the annual Sarbanes-Oxley certification requirements.

Joseph “Joe” Thomas, Principal and Expert with Bates Group, is quoted in an Ignites (FT's Mutual Funds industry publication) article on the new proposed FINRA rule concerning vulnerable and elderly clients.  Click to read the full story.