Reframing and Reforming the Securities and Exchange Commission: Lessons from Literature on Change Leadership

The article discusses the lessons learned from the restructuring of the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) under the Sarbanes-Oxley Act. The strengths and weakness of the SEC reform measures are highlighted. Key reform proposals stemming from the global financial crisis and reform efforts being undertaken as of the spring of 2010 include overhauling or abolishing the SEC, managing the SEC through the Federal Reserve or the Department of the Treasury, and combining the SEC with the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC)

Securities and Exchange Commission vs. Kim Kardashian, Cryptocurrencies and the Major Questions Doctrine

The SEC has brought some highly publicized enforcement actions against Kim Kardashian and other celebrity social media influencers who received undisclosed payments for their endorsement of cryptocurrencies. This Article describes those cases and analyzes whether the SEC exceeds its authority under the Constitutional “major questions doctrine” recently applied by the Supreme Court in West Virginia v. EPA. That doctrine prohibits a federal agency from regulating activities that raise a major question that Congress, rather than the agency, must resolve. Such a question is one in which there is major political and economic interest and over which the agency has no clear authority from Congress to act. As this Article relates, the cryptocurrency market is of major political and economic interest to millions of individuals and businesses. It is also the subject of intense policymaking efforts in the Executive Branch and Congress. This Article further analyzes whether Congress granted the SEC clear authority to regulate the cryptocurrency market. It finds no such authority. In its absence, the SEC relies on the 1946 Supreme Court decision in SEC v. Howey as the basis for its jurisdictional claims. This Article finds that decision, which involved the sale of Florida orange grove investments to tourists, to be vague at best and anything but clear on whether cryptocurrencies are “securities” that are subject to SEC regulation

The Invisible Power of MacHines Revisiting the Proposed Flash Order Ban in the Wake of the Flash Crash

Technological innovation continues to make trading and markets more efficient, generally benefitting market participants and the investing public. But flash trading, a practice that evolved from high-frequency trading, benefits only a select few sophisticated traders and institutions with the resources necessary to view and respond to flashed orders. This practice undermines the basic principles of fairness and transparency in securities regulation, exacerbates information asymmetries and harms investor confidence. This iBrief revisits the Securities and Exchange Commission\u27s proposed ban on the controversial practice of flash trading and urges the Securities and Exchange Commission and the Commodity Futures Trading Commission to implement the ban across the securities and futures markets. Banning flash trading will not impact high-frequency trading or other advantageous innovative trading practices, and will benefit all market participants by making prices and liquidity more transparent. In the wake of the May 6, 2010 flash crash and the passage of the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act, now is an opportune time for the Securities and Exchange Commission and Commodity Futures Trading Commission to implement the ban

The Invisible Power of MacHines Revisiting the Proposed Flash Order Ban in the Wake of the Flash Crash

Technological innovation continues to make trading and markets more efficient, generally benefitting market participants and the investing public. But flash trading, a practice that evolved from high-frequency trading, benefits only a select few sophisticated traders and institutions with the resources necessary to view and respond to flashed orders. This practice undermines the basic principles of fairness and transparency in securities regulation, exacerbates information asymmetries and harms investor confidence. This iBrief revisits the Securities and Exchange Commission\u27s proposed ban on the controversial practice of flash trading and urges the Securities and Exchange Commission and the Commodity Futures Trading Commission to implement the ban across the securities and futures markets. Banning flash trading will not impact high-frequency trading or other advantageous innovative trading practices, and will benefit all market participants by making prices and liquidity more transparent. In the wake of the May 6, 2010 flash crash and the passage of the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act, now is an opportune time for the Securities and Exchange Commission and Commodity Futures Trading Commission to implement the ban

The Cryptic Nature of Crypto Digital Assets Regulations: The Ripple Lawsuit and Why the Industry Needs Regulatory Clarity

The tension and associated time lag between technology and regulation has been well documented. Paradigmatic of this phenomenon is the global evolution of blockchain technology and digital assets. Digital assets in the blockchain allow users to transact directly without financial intermediaries. However, the regulatory guidelines for the assets, their issuance, and the subsequent transactions are unclear. The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has filed an action to apply its existing regulations and the judicial interpretations to Ripple’s issuance of XRP, its token, and Ripple’s control over subsequent user transactions of XRP. This Note uses SEC v. Ripple as a case study to determine how digital assets are treated for securities purposes. It will also discuss the general regulatory and policy concerns of digital asset transactions. SEC regulations require disclosures and minimize price manipulations to protect users and market integrity. The SEC has provided a framework, and Chairmen and Commissioners have given speeches regarding how digital asset transactions on exchanges would be regulated. However, the SEC has mainly used litigation to enforce its jurisdiction over certain digital assets by applying the Howey test; thus, its guidelines are based on an amalgamation of the facts and circumstances from different cases instead of what they should be: a robust regulatory framework specifically and thoughtfully tailored to how these digital assets might be regulated as users transact. This note reasons that regulatory clarity is necessary for this industry to flourish. Digital assets may be issued as a security but after time, as the digital assets are transferred between users and the network decentralizes, they begin to function more like a consumer token. Not only are digital assets valuable to society, but they are also transforming the financial industry. The Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) has also offered guidance on how it would regulate digital assets within its jurisdiction. Yet, the question remains which digital assets fall under CFTC jurisdiction, which are in the SEC’s jurisdiction, and how the digital asset community can know the difference. To provide greater clarity, this Note argues that the SEC should adopt Commissioner Hester Peirce’s Safe Harbor Proposal 2.0, which proposes monitoring these digital assets while allowing sufficient time for decentralization. If decentralized, the digital asset would be regulated by the CFTC, and, if not, the digital asset would be regulated by the SEC

Expanding the Investment Company Act: The SEC's Manipulation of the Definition of Security

The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) is sometimes accused of using the administrative process to graft new, substantive standards and obligations onto existing statutes or SEC rules. Through the use of the no-action letter process, the SEC staff sometimes creates substantive securities law which is inconsistent with the relevant federal securities statutes and case law. Many of these staff positions go far beyond reasonable and fair explanations of existing statutes or SEC rules. However, in substantive areas lacking definitive case law or rules, these no-action letters assume an extraordinary importance to securities lawyers and regulated entities. For all practical purposes, the SEC position becomes the law, whether or not the position is faithful to the statute. The SEC\u27s interpretation of the term security in the Investment Company Act of 19406 (Investment Company Act or Act) is a particularly egregious example of law-making by SEC administrative fiat The SEC\u27s authority under the Investment Company Act like its authority under the other federal securities statutes, turns on the presence of securities. The Act regulates investment companies, and, to be an investment company, an investment fund or program usually must both issue securities to its investors and invest in securities itself

Large-scale Complex IT Systems

This paper explores the issues around the construction of large-scale complex systems which are built as 'systems of systems' and suggests that there are fundamental reasons, derived from the inherent complexity in these systems, why our current software engineering methods and techniques cannot be scaled up to cope with the engineering challenges of constructing such systems. It then goes on to propose a research and education agenda for software engineering that identifies the major challenges and issues in the development of large-scale complex, software-intensive systems. Central to this is the notion that we cannot separate software from the socio-technical environment in which it is used.Comment: 12 pages, 2 figure

Washington report, vol. 13 no.3, March 12, 1984

https://egrove.olemiss.edu/aicpa_news/1961/thumbnail.jp

Securities industry developments - 1993; Audit risk alerts

https://egrove.olemiss.edu/aicpa_indev/1188/thumbnail.jp