After Receiving Wells Notice, Crypto.com Sues SEC to "Protect the Future of Crypto in the U.S."

Crypto Exchange Crypto.com Sues SEC, Chair Gary Gensler After Receiving Wells Notice

Cryptocurrency exchange Crypto.com said it sued the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, Chair Gary Gensler and its four commissioners after the regulator sent a Wells Notice – a warning that an enforcement action might be coming – to the company.

The court filing was made “to protect the future of crypto in the U.S.,” CEO Kris Marszalek said in a posting on X. The suit is “a warranted response to the SEC’s regulation by enforcement regime which has hurt more than 50 million American crypto holders.”

New CPA Paths Emerge as States Try to Stem Accountant Shortage

States are considering allowing prospective accountants to bypass a fifth year of school, one of the barriers to entry contributing to the shortage of workers in the field.

Under a proposal by two national accounting groups, CPA candidates can use an additional year of work experience instead of schoolwork to demonstrate professional and technical skills. That is on top of a bachelor’s degree, a passing grade on the qualifying exam and one year of work.

Companies, audit firms, professional groups and some state boards have been looking for ways to make the profession more appealing to students as fewer students graduate with an accounting degree and more workers quit for higher paying, less stressful jobs.

FTX bankruptcy judge approves more than $14 billion payback plan

The company says it has collected between $14.7 billion and $16.5 billion worth of property for distribution. FTX previously estimated that it owes creditors around $11.2 billion.

According to the plan approved by Delaware bankruptcy Judge John Dorsey, 98% of FTX’s creditors will get 119% of the amount of their allowed claim as of November 2022, when the exchange filed for bankruptcy protection.

Pharmaceutical Executive Pleads Guilty to Insider Trading

A former executive of a global pharmaceutical company pleaded guilty today in federal in Boston to earning more than $250,000 by trading on material non-public information.

Dishant Gupta, 40, of Hillsborough, N.J., pleaded guilty to one count of securities fraud. U.S. District Court Judge Julia E. Kobick scheduled sentencing for Jan. 9, 2025. Gupta was charged by Information in September 2024.

Gupta worked as the Director of Strategy and Operations in the Boston office of a global pharmaceutical company (Company A). In the spring of 2022, during the course of his employment at Company A, Gupta learned that Company A was negotiating to acquire certain assets of a smaller pharmaceutical company based in Boston (Company B), including its leading cancer drug, and that Company A later agreed to acquire Company B outright.

While in possession of this material non-public information, and in violation of his fiduciary duties to Company A, Gupta acquired shares of Company B in his own and his wife’s brokerage accounts – in an effort to profit from the eventual public announcement of the transaction. Gupta purchased more than 300,000 shares of Company B over approximately two and a half months. Gupta then sold all the shares he had acquired after Company A announced the acquisition of Company B, earning more than $250,000.

California lawyer ordered to pay $14 million over crypto Ponzi scheme

An 86-year-old, disbarred California attorney has been sentenced to five years of probation for his role in a $9.5 million cryptocurrency Ponzi scheme.

U.S. District Judge Gloria Navarro in Las Vegas on Monday also ordered the ex-Beverly Hills lawyer David Kagel to pay nearly $14 million in restitution after he pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy to commit commodity fraud.

Victims thought they were pouring money into a program that used trading bots to invest in cryptocurrency markets, prosecutors said. They were also falsely told that Kagel had $11 million in escrow that guaranteed their investments.

Kagel helped promote the scam by drafting letters on his law firm’s letterhead which were then sent to victims, creating a “false sense of security and trust,” prosecutors said.