The Return of Haim Bodek

Who is Haim Bodek?  Haim was the first whistleblower to expose how a major stock exchange (Direct Edge) created an order type (Hide Not Slide) that provided HFT firms with unfair advantages that propelled them to the exchanges’ best prices at investors’ expense.  Back in 2012, the financial media was all over this story and market structure savvy journalists like Scott Patterson were able to shine a light on these shady exchange practices.  Scott’s article “How “Hide Not Slide” Orders Work”  was a virtual blueprint in how unsuspecting investors were getting ripped off by HFT traders who were armed with Direct Edge’s special order type. Direct Edge was subsequently fined $14 million by the SEC for failing to properly describe order types.

Haim has been relatively quiet for the past few years (at least publicly) but he has just resurfaced as the whistleblower in the latest SEC case against the NYSE.  Last week, we wrote about the details of this case and how the NYSE was fined $14 million by the SEC for five serious violations.  Haim Bodek was the whistleblower for the most serious – in our view – of these five violations in which the NYSE failed to state that pegging interest orders created the possibility of detection of prices of non-displayed depth liquidity. read more »

Theranos founder Elizabeth Holmes charged with massive fraud

Theranos founder Elizabeth Holmes, who promised to revolutionize blood testing, has been charged by the SEC with a "massive fraud" involving more than $700 million.

Former president Ramesh "Sunny" Balwani was also charged. The two raised money from investors "through an elaborate, years-long fraud in which they exaggerated or made false statements about the company's technology, business, and financial performance," the SEC said Wednesday. read more »

Former Equifax CIO Jun Ying Accused of Insider Trading

A former senior executive at Equifax Inc. was criminally charged for allegedly selling almost $1 million worth of shares before the company’s announcement last year that it had suffered a massive data breach.

Jun Ying, Equifax’s ex-chief information officer for its U.S. information solutions business, allegedly used confidential information entrusted to him by the company to determine it had been hacked, the Securities and Exchange Commission said in a Wednesday statement. The U.S. Attorney’s office in Atlanta filed criminal charges against Ying, according to a separate statement. read more »

Panama Papers Law Firm Mossack Fonseca Closes Its Doors

The offshore law firm at the center of ICIJ’s Panama Papers investigation will shutter all its offices by the end of the month.

The law firm’s demise comes almost two years after the Panama Papers investigation revealed the offshore ties of some of the world’s most powerful and most corrupt people. The firm’s leaked internal files contained information on more than 214,000 offshore entities tied to 12 current or former heads of state, 140 politicians and others. The investigation also and brought down the prime ministers of Iceland and Pakistan.

Governments in Europe, Africa, Asia and the Americas have recovered more than $500 million as a result of the disclosures. read more »

Maryland firm fined $2M for bribing Russian nuclear official

A Maryland firm will pay a $2 million criminal penalty for bribing a Russian nuclear official for uranium-shipping contracts.

The U.S. Department of Justice said in a Tuesday release Transport Logistics International Inc. entered into a deferred prosecution agreement to resolve the case charging the company with conspiracy to violate the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act’s anti-bribery provisions.