SEC Will Close its Salt Lake Regional Office Later This Year

SEC to Close Salt Lake Regional Office

The Securities and Exchange Commission today announced that it will close its Salt Lake Regional Office (SLRO) later this year, reducing its regional footprint from 11 regional offices to 10.

The SLRO has long been the SEC’s smallest regional office and recently has experienced significant attrition. The agency considered its budget and organizational efficiency in deciding to close the office, and it has no plans to close any other regional offices. All current staff will be aligned to existing SEC organizational components based on their current functions and agency mission needs.

The SLRO’s enforcement jurisdiction over the state of Utah will be shifted to the SEC’s Denver Regional Office. The SEC’s National Exam Program previously shifted SLRO’s local jurisdiction to Denver many years ago; thus, regional examinations authority will be unaffected by the closure of the office.

BlackRock, Citadel Back Upstart Texas Challenge to NYSE, Nasdaq

BlackRock Inc., Citadel Securities and other investors are backing an upstart Texas stock market to challenge the New York Stock Exchange and Nasdaq Inc.

The Texas Stock Exchange has raised $120 million and plans to file registration documents with the US Securities and Exchange Commission, according to a LinkedIn post by James Lee, the exchange’s chief executive officer.

The Texas bourse will try to entice companies seeking relief from increasing compliance costs at the NYSE and Nasdaq, Lee told the Wall Street Journal, which earlier reported the development. While entirely electronic, Lee’s post said the TXSE will be headquartered in Dallas, bolstering a metro area that has been gaining financial jobs from the likes of Goldman Sachs Group Inc. and Charles Schwab Corp.

SEC Charges Former Executives of HF Foods Group with Concealing Millions of Dollars of Liabilities and Misappropriating Investor Funds

The Securities and Exchange Commission yesterday charged Zhou Min Ni and Jian Ming (Jonathan) Ni, former executives of Nevada-based restaurant food distribution company HF Foods Group, Inc., for their role in a fraudulent scheme to hide millions of dollars of HF Foods’s liabilities, misappropriate investor funds, and mislead the company’s auditors.

According to the SEC’s complaint, which was filed in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, Zhou Min Ni, while serving as HF Foods’s CEO and Chairman, misappropriated company funds for himself and his family, including to finance and maintain a stable of exotic vehicles. The SEC’s complaint also alleges that Zhou Min Ni used misleading documents to hide millions of dollars in liabilities and misled the company’s auditors. The SEC’s complaint further alleges that Jonathan Ni, who served as CFO of HF Foods from 2018 until April 2019, knowingly and substantively assisted Zhou Min Ni’s scheme.

SEC Charges Former Lumentum Executive with Insider Trading

On June 3, 2024, the Securities and Exchange Commission filed insider trading charges against Andre Wong for unlawfully trading the securities of NeoPhotonics Corporation (“NeoPhotonics”) ahead of an announcement that his then-employer, Lumentum Holdings Inc. (“Lumentum”), had agreed to acquire NeoPhotonics.

According to the SEC’s complaint, filed in federal district court in the Southern District of New York, Wong learned material nonpublic information about Lumentum’s plans to acquire NeoPhotonics from a colleague at Lumentum. Based on this information, Wong purchased 10,000 shares of NeoPhotonics stock ahead of Lumentum’s acquisition announcement and generated approximately $62,000 in illegal profits.

Musk Chose Who Got Chips

If you are the chief executive officer and controlling shareholder of two different companies, each with different minority shareholders and employees, and they both use the same essential scarce inputs, and the sole supplier of those inputs calls you up and says “we are backed up and can only meet the needs of one of your companies, which one should get the inputs and which should go without,” what should you do?

The extremely obvious answer is that you should not be the CEO and controlling shareholder of two different companies that compete for the same inputs! There is not a good answer!….

Elon Musk is the CEO and controlling shareholder of like six different companies, many of which are to varying degrees in the artificial intelligence business, so of course everyone is mad at him all the time….

Ozy Media Executive Tells Jury How He Posed as YouTube Official on Goldman Call

Ozy Media Inc.’s former chief operating officer Samir Rao told a federal jury how he used a voice-altering app to impersonate a YouTube executive on a call with Goldman Sachs Group Inc. in a desperate bid to win a $35 million investment.

Rao, who’s testifying as part of a plea agreement, said he conspired with Ozy Media co-founder Carlos Watson to pose as YouTube executive Alex Piper during a February 2021 conference call in order to fool Goldman into thinking the failing digital media company was profitable.

Watson is on trial in Brooklyn, New York, on charges that he conspired to defraud investors out of tens of millions of dollars….