Blog

Our experts frequently write blog posts about the findings of the research we are conducting.

Displaying 281-290 out of 695 results

Why Banks Are Storing Physical Commodities, and Why it May Matter

(Jul 2013)

Physical commodities -- barrels of oil, bars of gold, bushels of wheat, etc. -- are used for a variety of industrial purposes, but can also be bought and sold in financial markets. Most commodities trading involves futures contracts, as trading the physical commodity itself involves transportation and storage costs. Traditionally, banks who traded commodities were only allowed to deal in derivatives such as futures contracts, rather than dealing in the physical commodity itself.

But since the...

FINRA Focuses Investigation of High-Frequency Trading Firms

(Jul 2013)

In January, FINRA released their annual regulatory and examinations priorities for the upcoming year, in which they vowed to "focus significant resources" on, among other things, algorithmic trading and high-frequency trading (HFT) abuses. They have already levied a record fine against a brokerage firm for failing to supervise manipulative high-frequency trading, and their emphasis on HFT issues mirrors efforts by the SEC and CFTC to bring the HFT industry under better regulatory...

SEC Litigation Releases: Week in Review - July 19th, 2013

(Jul 2013)

Court Finds Massachusetts-Based Viking Financial Group, Inc. and its Owner Steven Palladino Liable for Violations of the Securities Laws
July 18, 2013, (Litigation Release No. 22752)
The federal district court in Massachusetts "held that...Steven Palladino, and his...company, Viking Financial Group, Inc., committed securities fraud." According to the SEC, "since April 2011, Palladino and Viking falsely promised at least 33 investors that their money would be used to conduct the business of...

Persistence Scorecard: Even Harder to Stay on Top

(Jul 2013)

S&P Dow Jones Indices has recently updated their semiannual Persistence Scorecard, which studies the consistency of returns for actively managed US equity mutual funds. Like the previous Persistence Scorecard from December 2012, the updated study finds little evidence that actively-managed mutual funds can outperform stated benchmarks on a consistent basis.

In fact, the results are rather worse than in the previous study. The report highlights three factors:

Percentage of funds in top quartile...

SEC Halts Texas-Based Forex Trading Scheme

(Jul 2013)

The SEC recently halted a foreign exchange ('forex') trading scheme run by Kevin G. White, an unregistered Plano, TX-based money manager.¹ White raised $7.1 million of investor capital through KGW Capital Management and Revelation Forex Fund representing that Revelation had achieved returns of approaching 400% since January 2009.²

Investors should realize that such persistent outsized returns are extremely unlikely. Indeed, bank and brokerage records reveal that the Revelation Forex Fund did...

The Basics of Insurance Linked Securities

(Jul 2013)

Financial innovation is typically associated with banks, but lately we've seen a number of new financial products developed and sold by insurance companies. Some of the most interesting products are known as insurance-linked securities, or ILS.

In the broadest sense, ILS transfer risk from insurance companies to investors. The largest segment of the ILS market is in catastrophe bonds (or 'cat bonds' for short), whose interest and principal payments depend on a specifically defined natural...

Misrepresentation of Asset Quality in RMBS

(Jul 2013)

Investors in Residential Mortgage Backed Securities (RMBS) have suffered tremendous losses since 2007. Many junior and mezzanine investors were wiped out by the asset pools' delinquency rates coupled with the subordination embedded in these structured securities. Since then, there has been a proliferation of litigation alleging that the underwriters and originators of RMBS misrepresented the risks of these products. An interesting new paper by Professors Piskorski and Witkin of Columbia...

SEC Litigation Releases: Week in Review - July 12th, 2013

(Jul 2013)

Serial Fraudster Matthew J. Gagnon Sentenced to Five Years in Prison
July 11, 2013, (Litigation Release No. 22749)
This week Matthew J. Gagnon was sentenced to "five years of incarceration followed by three years of supervised release and ordered...to pay over $4.4 million in restitution to his victims." Gagnon had pleaded guilty to "one count of criminal securities fraud for promoting a securities offering without fully disclosing the amount of his compensation in connection with his...

Regulators Impose Record Fine for Brokerage Firm's Supervisory Failures

(Jul 2013)

Yesterday evening, the Wall Street Journal reported that FINRA and several US exchanges fined the brokerage firm Newedge USA, LLC $9.5 million over alleged failures to adequately restrict automated client trading activity that "sought to manipulate U.S. markets for nearly four years." The trading activity took place on several exchanges including NYSE Euronext, NASDAQ OMX, and BATS Global Markets according to the WSJ article. FINRA's press release can be found on the FINRA website.

Newedge...

Hedge Funds and Private Placements May Soon Solicit Retail Investors

(Jul 2013)

According to the Wall Street Journal, the SEC will soon lift the ban on soliciting shares of hedge funds and other private placement investments to the general public, "a move that's expected to unleash a wave of ads touting such investments." We've been covering this story for some time, as the SEC has seemed reluctant to implement this new rule due to concerns from Congress and others over the lack of investor protections.

However, the SEC may have no choice. Lifting the ban was required by...

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