Secretary of Commerce Gary Locke continued the administration’s push to boost U.S. exports 100% by 2015 in accordance with President Obama’s 3/11/10 executive order establishing the National Export Initiative (“NEI”).  Last week, Secretary Locke addressed the 2010 International District Export Council (“DEC”) at a conference in Detroit, noting recent economic successes as a result of the NEI…

Companies expanding in foreign countries often engage consultants to assist in marketing to and negotiating with foreign officials.  In recent years, they have become increasingly careful to consider whether payments for such services may implicate concerns under the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA).  On September 1, 2010, the DOJ released its third FCPA Opinion Procedure…

In a November 2009 speech before the Tenth Annual Pharmaceutical Regulatory and Compliance Congress in Washington D.C., Assistant Attorney General Lanny A. Breuer put big pharma on notice that DOJ intended to aggressively investigate potential violations of the FCPA within the pharmaceutical and medical device industry.  The DOJ’s FCPA team appears to be backing that…

In a detailed, 122-page opinion (pdf), U.S. District Court Judge John G. Koeltl systematically dismantled and dismissed the SEC’s first-ever credit default swap insider trading case.  In SEC  v. Jon-Paul Rorech and Renato Negrin (pdf), the SEC alleged that Deutsche Bank bond salesman, Jon-Paul Rorech, passed material, non-public information to a Millennium Partners…

There is good reason, beyond anger, voyeurism and schadenfreude, for Wall Street and “Main Street” to keep their eyes on the SEC enforcement action against investment banking firm Goldman Sachs & Co and one of its vice presidents, Fabrice Tourre. 
According to the SEC’s complaint (pdf), Goldman was paid by one of the world’s largest hedge…

You need to follow along closely because this can get a bit confusing.  As we all recall, in 2003, judgments were entered against 12 of the largest Wall Street firms that issued research and engaged in investment banking, commonly referred to as “The Global Settlement.”  The Global Settlement imposed significant restrictions on interactions between the research analysts and investment bankers at these firms in order to stymie the bankers from influencing analyst coverage decisions.

The Global Settlement provided that with respect to any provision that had not been expressly superseded by subsequent rulemaking within five years, it was the expectation of the parties that, “the SEC would agree to an amendment or modification of such term, subject to Court approval, unless the SEC believes such amendment or modification would not be in the public interest.”

Ultimately, the parties agreed to seek Court approval to modify specific provisions, rather than all, of the Global Settlement.  In an order issued March 15, 2010 (pdf), U.S. District Judge William H. Pauley III approved all of the parties proposed modifications, with the exception of one.

WSJ reported on March 17, 2010