The SEC charged Germany-based insurance and asset management company Allianz SE with violating the books and records and internal controls provisions of the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA) for alleged improper payments to government officials in Indonesia during a seven-year period. Banoun and Clark Comment: The Allianz Cease-and-Desist (C&D) represents yet another example of the SEC’s obtaining disgorgement of profits based upon alleged violations of the FCPA’s accounting and internal controls provisions. Neither Allianz nor its Indonesian subsidiary was charged with violating the anti

The SEC charged a hedge fund manager with conducting a "cherry-picking" scheme by steering winning trades to proprietary trading accounts, and favored clients, to the detriment of certain hedge fund investors. The adviser was also charged with failing to disclose the firm's "precarious financial condition" to clients in a timely manner. See: SEC Complaint. See also: SEC Litigation Release.

The CFTC announced that it has approved a final rule to expand the CFTC's recordkeeping requirements. The announced rule change will amend CFTC Rules 1.35(a) (Records of Cash Commodity, Futures, and Option Transactions) and 1.31 (Books and Records; Keeping and Inspection) to conform them to recordkeeping requirements for SDs and MSPs under Dodd-Frank. The final rule amends Rule 1.35(a) to require that FCMs, IBs with aggregate gross revenue exceeding $5 million over the preceding three years, retail fx dealers ("RFEDs"), and certain members of designated contract markets ("DCMs") and swap

The CFTC's Division of Swap Dealer and Intermediary Oversight (DSIO) issued a no-action letter providing certain swap dealers with limited relief surrounding the requirement that chief compliance officers of such swap dealers prepare and submit an annual report, pursuant to Commission Regulation 3.3. The relief is applicable to all swap dealers that: (1) are required to register by December 31, 2012; (2) are currently regulated by a U.S. prudential regulator or are registrants of the SEC; and (3) have a fiscal year-end of December 31, 2012 (Covered Firms). According to the letter, the Division

SIFMA issued its 2013 and 2014 holiday schedules for full and early market closes for the trading of US dollar-denominated fixed-income securities in the United States, the United Kingdom and Japan. View release in full here (links externally to SIFMA website).