In Search of "Some Useful Function in the Real World"

Brinks fined $400K over restrictive whistleblower language in contracts

Brinks, without admitting or denying the agency’s findings, reached agreement with the SEC on Wednesday to settle charges that the confidentiality and nondisclosure agreements it required new employees to sign contained clauses that prohibited workers from disclosing confidential financial information to third parties without the company’s consent. The agreements contained language that threatened current and former employees with $75,000 in liquidated damages, as well as legal fees, if they failed to notify the company before disclosing such information.

The SEC requires such agreements contain an exemption for potential SEC whistleblowers. Brinks failed to provide this exemption in certain of its confidentiality agreements from 2015-19, the agency said. Brinks added the whistleblower exemption to confidentiality and nondisclosure agreements for executive-level employees in 2017, the SEC said, but not to agreements with all Brinks employees until April 2019.

Small Businesses Plead With SEC to Show Restraint on Climate Rules 

Farms, independent manufacturers and other small businesses that don’t trade on stock exchanges normally don’t fall within the SEC’s purview; the agency regulates public companies and some other market participants. But small firms fear they will be forced to cough up heaps of information on their roles, however small, in emitting carbon because the SEC wants large public companies to catalog emissions in their entire supply chains.

“Small and independent businesses cannot afford the experts, accountants and lawyers needed to comply with complex government reporting regimes,” the National Federation of Independent Business said in a comment letter filed with the SEC.

Former Head of Corporate Communications of $21 Billion Biopharmaceutical Company Admits Insider Trading

Malik was among the first, and one of the few, employees who received the material non-public information about the breast cancer drug before the public announcement. Within minutes of obtaining that information, Malik passed it along to Wood, who lived with Malik at the time and was formerly employed by the same company. Before April 6, 2020, and within hours of receiving the insider information from Malik, Wood placed an order for approximately 7,000 shares of the company’s stock, despite the fact that during the same time period the company’s stock was downgraded by financial experts. After the company announced that its cancer drug had proven effective in pre-market clinical trials, its stock price increased. After selling her shares, Wood more than doubled her investment, realizing gross profits of $213,618.

The securities fraud charge to which Wood pleaded guilty carries a potential penalty of 20 years in prison and a $5 million fine.  Sentencing is scheduled for Nov. 21, 2022.

The Fire Burning Beneath Crypto’s MeltdownThe appeal of gold today is that it acts as a haven in bad times, and typically acts as a partial hedge against inflation. Bitcoin holders have discovered that not only is it not a hedge against inflation, it isn’t a haven either. Its price tends to move in line with risky assets, not safe ones. The gold price is up 4% in the past 12 months as inflation has soared, against a fall of 12% in the S&P 500 and a 43% loss for bitcoin. Digital, sure. Gold, not so much.

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But in the long run, crypto’s best hope of survival is to come up with some useful function in the real world. That will require another round of innovation, and there’s no reason to think it will be the existing cryptocurrencies, let alone bitcoin, that will be the winners.

Don’t Believe the Obits for Bitcoin

It may seem paradoxical to invest in a “predictable” money that loses 70% of its value, but early investors believe that in the long run the predictability of supply will be more important than demand-driven booms and busts. Bitcoin ownership is highly centralized in the hands of individuals who seldom move their coins. If you weathered the 2011 crash from $30 to $2 or the 2018 plummet from $19,000 to $5,000, this latest crash won’t shatter your belief in this project.

As a financial investment, bitcoin is highly speculative, more like venture capital than foreign exchange. If you have no beliefs about monetary theory, you might find these drops extremely unsettling. But strong beliefs are what allow people to ignore the market’s short-term signals and profit when the collective wisdom turns out in the long run to be wrong.

Sunny Balwani slammed as Theranos accomplice in trial

In a lengthy closing argument, federal prosecutors reiterated their case that Balwani was an active participant, alongside Holmes, in a scheme to defraud investors and patients of the doomed medical technology startup.

“Mr. Balwani is not a victim, he is the perpetrator of the fraud,” prosecutor Jeffrey Schenk told jurors during the proceedings.

Glencore Subsidiary Pleads Guilty to Bribery Charges in U.K.

The subsidiary, Glencore Energy (UK) Ltd., admitted to paying more than $28 million in bribes to secure access to oil across its operations in five African countries—Nigeria, Cameroon, Ivory Coast, Equatorial Guinea and South Sudan—according to an indictment filed in London’s Southwark Crown Court.

The financial penalty the company will pay in the U.K. will be determined at a sentencing scheduled for early November, according to the U.K.’s Serious Fraud Office, which oversaw that country’s investigation into Glencore.