In response to an escalating crisis, on March 6, 2014, President Obama issued Executive Order 13660 (linked below), blocking the property of certain persons contributing to the unstable situation in Ukraine. The Order allows the U.S. to impose economic sanctions against persons (individuals and entities) who are determined to be responsible for or complicit in activities that undermine the democratic process in Ukraine or threaten the peace, security, stability, sovereignty or territorial integrity of the country, including those who have provided material or financial assistance to such

FINRA Investor Education Foundation issued a new study titled "The Financial Capability of Young Adults - A Generational View," which reveals that millennials display low levels of financial literacy, engage in problematic financial behaviors and are worried about their debt. According to the results of the study, low levels of financial literacy hamper most millennials, with only 18 percent of young millennials (those who are 18 to 26) able to answer four to five questions correctly in a five-question financial literacy quiz. Among other results, the study details the following: Almost half

FINRA filed with the SEC a proposed rule change to adopt FINRA Rule 2243, which would establish disclosure and reporting obligations related to member recruitment practices when a representative changes firms and attempts to recruit certain customers from the representative's prior firm. The required disclosures would include information as to any increases in compensation that might be received by the representative, as well as any potential injury that might be suffered by a client whose assets were transferred. The latter includes fees to close the client's account at the prior firm and

The text of the FATCA IGA Agreement between the United States and the Republic of Chile that was signed on March 5, 2014 is now available. As previously indicated, it is a Model 2 form of IGA whereby Chile agrees to "direct and enable" all Reporting Chilean Financial Institutions to register on the FATCA registration website by July 1, 2014, and to comply with the requirements of an FFI Agreement with respect to due diligence, reporting and withholding. Under the terms of the IGA and the FFI Agreement, Reporting Chilean Financial Institutions will provide account information directly to the U

The CFTC Division of Market Oversight ("DMO") certified Bloomberg SEF LLC's ("Bloomberg") self-certification of certain interest rate swap and credit default swap ("CDS") contracts that have been made available to trade ("MAT Determinations"). The CFTC stated that this self-certification involves only certain IRS and CDS contracts made available to trade via earlier determinations that were self-certified on January 16, 2014, January 22, 2014 and January 27, 2014, respectively. Additionally, the CFTC stated that swaps subject to MAT Determinations, whether offered by trueEx or any other swap