Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC)

Administrative Order by the U.S. Securities and exchange Commission imposing fines of $1 million and $450,000, respectively, on Petroteq Energy, Inc., of Canada, and Aleksandr Blyumkin, of California.

Administrative Order by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission imposing a fine of $25 million on Tenaris S.A., described as "a global manufacturer and supplier of steel pipe products and related services, headquartered in Luxembourg", for "violations of the anti-bribery, books and records, and internal accounting controls provisions of the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act of 1977 by Tenaris, as a result of a bribe scheme involving agents and employees of its Brazilian subsidiary to obtain and retain business from a Brazil state-owned entity Petróleo Brasileiro S.A.".

Administrative Order by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission imposing a fine of $7 million on Wells Fargo Clearing Services LLC for "failure to timely file certain suspicious activity reports between April 2017 and October 2021" involving wire transfers "to or from certain foreign countries determined to be at a high risk or moderate risk for money laundering, terrorist financing or other illegal monetary movements", including "Costa Rica, Turkey, Honduras, the British Virgin Islands, Antigua, Cayman Islands, Ukraine, and Guernsey".

Administrative Order by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission imposing an industry ban on Thomas F. Plaut, described as "the sole owner, Chairman, and CEO of Worldwide Markets Ltd., a British Virgin Islands company with its principal place of business in Woodcliff Lake, New Jersey".

Plaintiff's emergency application for an order to show cause, temporary restraining order, preliminary injunction, asset freeze, receiver, and other relief in U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission v. StraightPath Venture Partners LLC, StraightPath Management LLC, Brian K. Martinsen, Michael A. Castillero, Francine A. Lanaia, and Eric D. Lachow at the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York.

Administrative Order by the U. S. Securities and Exchange Commission imposing a penalty of $23,987,520 on Stericycle, Inc., described as a Delaware-domiciled "world-wide provider of medical waste and other services" for "violations of the anti-bribery, books and records, and internal accounting controls provisions of the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act of 1977" involving "wholly-owned subsidiaries in Brazil, Mexico, and Argentina".

Administrative Order by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission imposing a suspension on John William Gunn, described as a citizen of the United Kingdom residing in Hong Kong.

Administrative Order by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission imposing an industry ban on Global Investment Strategy UK Ltd., described as "a financial services firm registered with and regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority of the United Kingdom, and is a member of the London Stock Exchange".

Administrative Order by the U. S. Securities and Exchange Commission that it has imposed a fine of $50 million on BlockFi Lending LLC, a New Jersey-based crypto lender, for regulatory breaches, including "material misrepresentation" and operating as "an Unregistered Investment Company".

Administrative Order by the U. S. Securities and Exchange Commission imposing an industry ban on Ran Armon, described as a citizen and resident of Canada, for an alleged fraud.

Administrative Order by the U. S. Securities and Exchange Commission imposing a fine of $30,000 on Nicholas Abbate, a resident of Staten Island, New York, for "his role in assisting others in a course of business that operated as a fraud or deceit upon clients and investors", including a mutual fund in the Cayman Islands that is not identified in the order but which OffshoreAlert believes is the Income Collecting 1-3 Months T-Bills Mutual Fund.

Administrative Order by the U. S. Securities and Exchange Commission imposing penalties totaling $1.2 million on Wedbush Securities Inc. for the "unregistered offers and sales of large blocks of low-priced securities by an offshore customer", namely Silverton SA, now known as Wintercap SA, described as "a purported Swiss asset manager", and failure to file suspicious activity reports.

Administrative Order by the U. S. Securities and Exchange Commission imposing a fine of $350,000 on WEX Inc., described as "a Maine-based reporting company that describes itself as a financial technology service provider" for failing "properly to devise and maintain a sufficient system of internal accounting controls at its Brazilian subsidiary, UNIK S.A.", that led to "errors in WEX Brazil’s financial statements back to fiscal year 2013 totaling approximately $85.5 million, mostly relating to the overstatement of unbilled receivables. This amount included about $8 million in suspected theft or unauthorized transactions by former WEX Brazil employees".

Administrative Order by the U. S. Securities and Exchange Commission imposing penalties totaling $6.4 million on VTB Capital Plc regarding "material omissions and misleading statements in a 2016 bond offering for which VTB Capital Plc, a London-based investment bank, acted with Credit Suisse Group AG as joint-lead manager".

Administrative Order by the U. S. Securities and Exchange Commission imposing penalties totaling $99 million on Credit Suisse Group AG, of Switzerland, regarding "an offering fraud and violations of the internal accounting controls and books and records provisions of the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act ... in connection with three interconnected transactions involving, among others, United Kingdom-based Credit Suisse entities and Mozambican state-owned entities".

Administrative Order by the U. S. Securities and Exchange Commission imposing penalties totaling $5.4 million on Robert D. Press to settle allegations of fraud involving TCA Fund Management Group Corp., of Florida, and four TCA fund entities in the Cayman Islands.

Administrative Order by the U. S. Securities and Exchange Commission imposing a fine of $50,000 on Donna M. Silverman to settle allegations of fraud involving TCA Fund Management Group Corp., of Florida, and TCA Global Credit Fund GP Ltd., of the Cayman Islands.

Administrative Order by the U. S. Securities and Exchange Commission imposing penalties totaling $22.5 million on WPP Plc, described as "the world's largest advertising group" that is domiciled in Jersey, in the Channel Islands; headquartered in London and New York City, and whose shares are listed on the New York Stock Exchange for alleged violations of "the anti-bribery, books and records, and international accounting controls provisions of the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act" involving its subsidiaries in Brazil, China, India, and Peru.

Administrative Order by the U. S. Securities and Exchange Commission imposing penalties totaling $778,244 on Helikon Investments Ltd., described as a United Kingdom company that is registered with the U.K. Financial Conduct Authority, to settle allegations that it "sold short American depositary shares and then, within the rule's five-day restricted period, purchased ADSs of the same issuer in an offering, thereby violating Rule 105", profiting "by $669,002 from the transaction".

Administrative Order by the U. S. Securities and Exchange Commission imposing an industry ban on Ronald P. Haller, 67, of Ontario, Canada, after. he pleaded guilty to fraud in Canada.

Administrative Order by the U. S. Securities and Exchange Commission stating that Murchinson Ltd., of Toronto, Canada; Marc Bistricer, and Paul Zogala, described as citizens and residents of Canada, have agreed to pay penalties totaling $9 million to settle a regulatory investigation that, inter alia, involved an unidentified Bermuda "hedge fund".

Administrative Order by the U. S. Securities and Exchange Commission imposing a fine of $1 million on Pearson Plc, described as a British publicly-listed "multinational educational publishing and services company", for "material misstatements and omissions regarding a 2018 cyber intrusion that affected several million rows of student data across 13,000 school, district, and university AIMSweb 1.0 customer accounts in the United States".

Administrative Order by the U. S. Securities and Exchange Commission imposing penalties totaling $10.3 million on Poloniex, LLC, of Delaware, for operating "a digital asset trading platform" without registering "as a national securities exchange".

Administrative Order by the U. S. Securities and Exchange Commission imposing penalties on Blockchain Credit Partners, d.b.a. DeFi Money Market, of the Cayman Islands; Gregory Keough, and Derek Acree, both of Florida, for an alleged fraud that involved selling "more than $30 million of securities in unregistered offerings by using smart contracts and "decentralized finance" technology to sell digital tokens".

Administrative Order by the U. S. Securities and Exchange Commission imposing penalties totaling $201,688 on Blotics Ltd., formerly doing business as Coinschedule Ltd., described as a United Kingdom-domiciled company that "owned and operated a once-popular website platform, www.coinschedule.com, that publicized current and upcoming offerings for different digital tokens and was accessible in the United States from 2016 to August 2019", for promoting a security without disclosing that it received compensation for doing so.

Administrative Order by the U. S. Securities and Exchange Commission imposing penalties of $8 million on Momentus Inc., Stable Road Acquisition Corp., SRC-NI Holdings LLC, and Brian Kabot for alleged securities fraud involving, inter alia, Mikhail Kokorich, described as "a Russian citizen residing in Switzerland".

Administrative Order by the U. S. Securities and Exchange Commission imposing penalties on PLS, CPA, Chang G. Park, Joseph Yongyun Lee, and Juchi Lee, all accountants, for "improper professional conduct" involving, inter alia, Interactive Multi-Media Auction Corporation, described as "a British Virgin Islands corporation with its principal place of business in the United Kingdom" and "formerly headquartered in Hong Kong".

Administrative Order by the U. S. Securities and Exchange Commission imposing penalties totaling $22.7 million on Amec Foster Wheeler Limited, described as a Switzerland-domiciled parent of a group "with a significant presence in the United Kingdom", regarding "a bribery scheme to obtain an oil and gas engineering and design contract in Brazil" involving Petróleo Brasileiro S.A. - Petrobras.

Administrative Order by the U. S. Securities and Exchange Commission imposing industry bans on Gil Beserglik, 64, a citizen of Israel; Raz Beserglik, 35, a citizen of Israel, and Kai Christian Petersen, 53, a citizen of Germany, regarding their involvement in binary options brokers.

Administrative Order by the U. S. Securities and Exchange Commission imposing a fine of $9 million on S&P Dow Jones Indices LLC for regulatory breaches involving Credit Suisse AG, of Switzerland.

Administrative Order by the U. S. Securities and Exchange Commission imposing sanctions, including a fine of $75,000, on Peter J. Decaprio, of Boston, Massachusetts, for regulatory breaches involving, inter alia, an "unregistered fund" in the British Virgin Islands.

Final Judgment in U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission v. Matthew Ledvina at the U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts.

Administrative Order by the U. S. Securities and Exchange Commission imposing an industry ban on David Hu for securities fraud involving International Investment Group LLC and funds in the Cayman Islands and Curaçao.

Administrative Order by the U. S. Securities and Exchange Commission imposing a fine of $650,000 on Wireline, Inc., described as a Delaware-domiciled "early-stage project focused on the development of a decentralized, blockchain based platform", for an unregistered securities offering and alleged fraud involving, inter alia, Wireline Developer Fund Ltd., a.k.a. Wireline Development Fund, of the Cayman Islands. Editor's Note: Research by OffshoreAlert showed that, in the Cayman Islands General Registry, the directors of Wireline Developer Fund Ltd. are identified as Lucas Geiger and Rich Burdon.

Administrative Order by the U. S. Securities and Exchange Commission imposing a penalty of $43.3 million on Deutsche Bank AG for regulatory breaches involving, inter alia, entities in Abu Dhabi, British Virgin Islands, China, Italy, and Saudi Arabia.

Administrative Order by the U. S. Securities and Exchange Commission imposing a fine of $250,000 on Tierion, Inc. for regulatory breaches involving the sale of digital tokens by its "Cayman Islands-subsidiary, Tierion International Ltd.". Editor's Note: Research by OffshoreAlert in the Cayman Islands General Registry showed that the directors of Tierion International Ltd. are Casey McDonald and Wayne Vaughan.

Administrative Order by the U. S. Securities and Exchange Commission imposing an industry ban on Mustafa Abdel Wadood, described as a citizen of Egypt, for "the misappropriation of fund assets from one private equity fund client of the Abraaj Group and an offering fraud against investors in another Abraaj fund".

Administrative Order by the U. S. Securities and Exchange Commission imposing a fine of $65 million on Robinhood Financial, LLC, described as a Delaware-domiciled "self-directed securities brokerage" based in Menlo Park, California, for "material misrepresentations and omissions by Robinhood relating to its revenue sources".

Administrative Order by the U. S. Securities and Exchange Commission imposing a financial penalty of $1,589,926 on Mancera SC, described as "the Mexican member firm of Ernst & Young Global", and bans on accountants Alejandro Valdez Mendoza, CP and Angel Radames Corral Nieblas, CP, both citizens of Mexico, for regulatory breaches regarding Desarrolladora Homex, SAB de CV, which was described as a construction firm that "engaged in a massive fraudulent accounting scheme over at least a three-year period" and whose shares were listed on the Mexican Stock Exchange and New York Stock Exchange.

Administrative Order by the U. S. Securities and Exchange Commission imposing a fine of $450,000 on Mark E. Watson III for his "role" in Bermuda-based insurer Argo Group International Holdings Ltd.'s failure to disclose "over $5.3 million in perquisites and personal benefits" while he was the company's CEO, President, and a director.

Administrative Order by the U. S. Securities and Exchange Commission imposing penalties totaling $170 million on BlueCrest Capital Management Limited, of Jersey, in the Channel Islands, for regulatory breaches involving, inter alia, BlueCrest Capital International Master Fund Limited and BSMA Limited, both of the Cayman Islands.

Administrative Order by the U. S. Securities and Exchange Commission imposing an industry ban on Rajesh Taneja, described as "a citizen of Canada and a resident of Vietnam", for alleged fraud and unregistered activity.

Administrative Order by the U. S. Securities and Exchange Commission imposing a fine of $13,000 on Tradenet Capital Markets Ltd., of Israel, for regulatory breaches.

Administrative Order by the U. S. Securities and Exchange Commission imposing penalties totaling $1.06 billion on The Goldman Sachs Group, Inc. regarding "a scheme perpetrated by now former senior employees of Goldman Sachs who authorized and paid bribes and kickbacks to government officials in Malaysia and the Emirate of Abu Dhabi in order to secure lucrative business for the Company and benefits for themselves" involving 1Malaysia Development Berhad, a.k.a. 1MDB.

Administrative Order by the U. S. Securities and Exchange Commission revoking the registration of securities issued by Big Time Holdings, Inc., described as a "forfeited Delaware corporation located in Douglas, Isle of Man". Editor's Note: In a filing with the SEC on October 29th, 2018, Big Time Holdings Inc. identified its CEO and sole director as David Smeed, its former directors and officers as Thomas DeNunzio, Brian Kistler, and Mandla Gwadiso, and its principal shareholders as Ascot Group Plc, of the Isle of Man, and Palewater Global Management, Inc., of New York, NY. Records filed with the Isle of Man's Companies Registry show that the directors of Ascot Group Plc are David Gordon Smeed, of Dublin, Ireland, and Lee John Bernard Murphy, of the Isle of Man.

Administrative Order by the U. S. Securities and Exchange Commission imposing penalties totaling $27,416,565 on JBS S.A., Joesley Batista, and Wesley Batista, all of Brazil, regarding "a bribery scheme".

Administrative Order by the U. S. Securities and Exchange Commission imposing a fine of $25 million and disgorgement of $10 million on J.P. Morgan Securities LLC for regulatory breaches.

Administrative Order by the U. S. Securities and Exchange Commission imposing a fine of $1.25 million on Kroll Bond Rating Agency, LLC for regulatory breaches.

Administrative Order by the U. S. Securities and Exchange Commission imposing penalties totaling $764,836 on Kroll Bond Rating Agency, LLC for regulatory breaches.

Administrative Order by the U. S. Securities and Exchange Commission imposing a fine of $9.5 million on Fiat Chrysler Automobiles N.V. , described as "a Dutch public company headquartered in London, United Kingdom", for the "VW 'dieselgate' scandal".