Boeing and Former CEO Settle SEC Charges of Misleading Investors About 737 Max Crashes

Boeing to Pay $200 Million to Settle SEC Charges that it Misled Investors about the 737 MAX

The Securities and Exchange Commission today charged The Boeing Company and its former CEO, Dennis A. Muilenburg, with making materially misleading public statements following crashes of Boeing airplanes in 2018 and 2019. The crashes involved Boeing’s 737 MAX airplane and a flight control function called the Maneuvering Characteristics Augmentation System (MCAS). According to the SEC’s orders, after the first crash, Boeing and Muilenburg knew that MCAS posed an ongoing airplane safety issue, but nevertheless assured the public that the 737 MAX airplane was “as safe as any airplane that has ever flown the skies.” Later, following the second crash, Boeing and Muilenburg assured the public that there were no slips or gaps in the certification process with respect to MCAS, despite being aware of contrary information.

SEC Charges Former EY Employee with Insider Trading

The Securities and Exchange Commission charged Michael Weiss with insider trading in the stock of four Ernst & Young LLP (“EY”) clients or prospective clients (“EY Client Companies”) made while he was employed as an EY Business Development Director. The SEC’s complaint, filed in federal court in Manhattan, alleges that Weiss’ work on EY business development teams or “pursuits” provided him with access to clients’ and prospective clients’ confidential and sensitive information. On four separate occasions between July 2014 and September 2015, while in possession and on the basis of that material nonpublic information, and in breach of his duties to EY and its clients, Weiss purchased EY Client Companies’ shares in advance of earnings and acquisition announcements. As alleged in the complaint, Weiss obtained illicit profits from those trades of approximately $10,286.

US House May Vote Next Week on a Congressional Stock-Trade Ban

The framework includes much of what prominent advocates of stock-ban legislation have asked for, such as including spouses and dependent children in any potential ban.

Other framework provisions call for:

--Mandatory electronic filing of financial disclosures, as some officials submit all-but-illegible disclosures.

--Requiring “more granularity” when disclosing financial trades. Currently, lawmakers are only required to disclosure the values of their trades in broad ranges, such as $100,000 to $250,000 or $1 million to $5 million.

--A ban on senior government officials, including members of Congress and their immediate families, from trading cryptocurrencies.

Lofgren’s framework also includes one class of government official alongside members of Congress — Supreme Court justices. It’s a move that advocates view as a potential “poison pill” meant to ensure the legislation is unable to pass the Senate.

First Woman SEC Commissioner Discusses Work, Retirement and Life

Klein: You’ve reinvented yourself numerous times. What motivated you to make these professional changes and what does it require to take chances and be successful at new ventures or second — and even third, fourth — acts?

Karmel: It had to do partly with my personality, that I was always interested in learning something new. But it also had to do with the ups and downs of my career and the ups and downs on Wall Street. I left the SEC the first time because I was kind of bored with just doing fraud cases and all my friends had left. A lot of them went in-house and were the first compliance people at brokerage firms as the field of legal compliance was taking off. I always wanted to be with a big law firm, thinking, “That’s the real practice of law.” But when I graduated from law school, I just didn’t get that opportunity; the firms were not hiring women.

By the time I left the SEC, some firms had started hiring women as associates. I left the first firm I went to because I did not become a partner and I had the opportunity to go to Rogers & Wells as a partner. Then I had the great fortune of being able to go back to the SEC as a commissioner. Afterward, I went back to Rogers & Wells, and then into teaching. That’s the abbreviated version of my career.

UK Introduces Law to Seize, Freeze and Recover Crypto

The U.K. introduced a bill to make it easier for law enforcement agencies to seize, freeze and recover crypto assets when used for criminal activities such as money laundering, drugs and cybercrime, the government said Thursday.

The 250-page Economic Crime and Corporate Transparency bill, first promised in May, was introduced by the Home Office, Department for Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy, Serious Fraud Office and Treasury and covers more than just crypto. It had its first reading in the House of Commons on Thursday, with the second reading scheduled for Oct. 13.

Push to Enhance CFTC’s Crypto Watchdog Role Gets a Boost in US Congress

Congress’ attempt to make the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) the primary U.S. cryptocurrency regulator took a procedural step forward on Thursday, with a House of Representatives lawmaker introducing a bill supporting a parallel effort in the Senate.

The Senate legislation – introduced in August by the leaders of the Senate Agriculture Committee, Chairwoman Debbie Stabenow (D-Mich.) and senior Republican, John Boozman (R-Ark.) – is a relatively narrow effort to install the CFTC as a leading agency to oversee digital assets trading and to exercise new authority over crypto spot markets. Now, that effort has been joined in the House, shepherded by Rep. Sean Patrick Maloney (D-N.Y.), the chairman of the Commodity Exchanges, Energy, and Credit Subcommittee and also the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee.