Securities Industry News

James A. Rivera, 42 of Carson, California, USA has been sentenced to 12 years in jail and told to hand back USD1 million to people he tricked into investing in a wind energy scheme that ran out of puff.

The Securities and Exchange Commission has amended its rules to exclude the value of a person’s home from net worth calculations used to determine whether an individual may invest in certain unregistered securities offerings.

Elisa Rietbergen, 38, of Kensington, New South Wales and Joseph Levi, 39, of Surry Hills, New South Wales, have both pleaded guilty to a charge of insider trading in Downing Magistrates' Court. Rietbergen was formerly employed by JP Morgan Chase Bank.

It's almost undignified - until reality sets in. Despite all the talk of home regulators being principally responsible for companies headquartered in their jurisdiction, when push comes to shove, the lesson from the current global financial crisis is that it's every regulator for himself. And with the first collapse of a near-worldwide financial services business since Lehman Bros, MF Global is a test for the new attitudes. Why haven't you heard of MF Global? Its because you probably know it by its former name: Man Financial.

The Supreme Court of NSW yesterday made interim orders preventing Mr Steven Hui Xiao, the managing director of Hanlong Mining, from leaving Australia until 22 September 2011, other than to visit Hong Kong between 13 and 14 September 2011 to attend to visa requirements.

US v Credit Ratings "agencies." The US government is under fire from so-called credit ratings agencies - commercial concerns that opine on the value of companies and assets - and, importantly, - governments. As the three main companies, Moodies, Fitch and Standard & Poors, line up to bit the hand that has fed them for more than a decade, the US government is fighting back and the securities industry is a part of that battleground.

Boston, Massachussets, company Axiom Valuation says that fraud by investment fund managers can be discovered by applying a formula to the declared results from a fund and comparing them to the declared investment strategy.

Three directors of failed New Zealand finance company Nathans have been found guilty of offences under the Securities Act. But the court said they did not act dishonestly.

Sir Allen Stanford has not been convicted of any offence. Nor have any regulatory proceedings been concluded against him. Yet the USA's Securities and Exchange Commission has decided that he ran a Ponzi scheme and that "investors" are entitled to certain statutory protections.

New Zealand's newly unified regulator, the Financial Markets Authority, has today made an interim order to stop allotment of securities by GFNZ Group Limited (formerly known as Geneva Finance Limited).