Regulatory Violations

March 23, 2016

JPMorgan Ventures Energy Corp. and JPMorgan Chase Bank, N.A.  have agreed to pay a $225,000 penalty to resolve charges of failing to comply with their obligations to submit accurate large trader reports for physical commodity swap positions.  CFTC

March 15, 2016

The CFTC announced that a federal district court has unsealed a civil complaint the CFTC filed with the Northern District of Illinois on February 2, 2016, against two foreign web-based binary options firms, Vault Options, Ltd. and Global Trader 365, both Israeli web-based companies. The CFTC’s complaint alleges that the two firms unlawfully solicited and accepted more than $1 million from at least 50 U.S. customers to trade off-exchange binary options contracts, defrauded those customers, and operated as unregistered Futures Commission Merchants.  CFTC

March 14, 2016

The CFTC ordered Florida-based IBFX, Inc. to pay a $1 million penalty for failing to meet capital requirements, failing to report minimum net capital violations on time, supervisory failures, and violating a previous CFTC order.  CFTC

March 9, 2016

A Las Vegas court ordered Banc de Binary Ltd., ET Binary Options Ltd., BO Systems Ltd., BDB Services Ltd., and Oren Shabat Laurent to pay over $9 million in penalties and restitution for violating the CFTC's prohibition against trading binary options off-exchange.  CFTC

March 9, 2016

The CFTC ordered CHS, Inc. and CHS Hedging, LLC  to pay $1 million for inaccurately reporting positions in corn and soybeans.  CFTC

February 24, 2016

The CFTC filed charges against Florida resident Neil Pecker and his company, Vision Financial Partners, LLC, alleging they engaged in fraud in connection with off-exchange binary options and registration violations.  The CFTC complaint alleges that the defendants solicited almost $3 million from over 120 clients in the U.S. and Canada while misappropriating almost $2 million of the funds for their personal use.  CFTC

February 22, 2016

The CFTC sued North American Asset Management, LLC of Fort Lauderdale, Florida; its owner and president Alexi Bethel of Miami, Florida; and its owner and managing director Steven Labadie of Lake Worth, Florida. The CFTC complaint charges the defendants with engaging in illegal, off-exchange transactions in precious metals with retail customers on a leveraged, margined, or financed basis.  CFTC

February 19, 2016

The CFTC filed a civil enforcement action against Ryan S. Magee of Calgary, Alberta, Canada, with fraud and also with acting as a Commodity Pool Operator, without being registered with the CFTC, as required.  The CFTC complaint also charged Ryan Magee’s father and wife, David W. Magee and Dalyne Rae Magee, also both Calgary residents, with acting as Associated Persons of Ryan Magee, without being registered with the CFTC, as required.  CFTC

February 9, 2015

St. Louis-based agribusiness Monsanto Company will pay an $80 million penalty to settle charges that it violated accounting rules and misstated company earnings with respect to its flagship product Roundup.  In addition, three accounting and sales executives will pay $135,000 collectively to settle charges against them.  An SEC investigation found that Monsanto had insufficient internal controls to properly account for millions of dollars in rebates offered to retailers and distributors of Roundup after generic competition had undercut Monsanto’s prices and resulted in a significant loss of market share for the company.  Monsanto booked substantial revenue resulting from sales incentivized by the rebate programs but failed to recognize all of the related program costs at the same time.  Therefore, Monsanto materially misstated its consolidated earnings in corporate filings during a three-year period.   Monsanto’s CEO and former CFO reimbursed the company $3,165,852 and $728,843 respectively, for cash bonuses and certain stock awards received during the period when the company committed the accounting violations.  SEC

February 2, 2016

Fourteen municipal underwriting firms will pay civil penalties to settle charges under the SEC’s Municipalities Continuing Disclosure Cooperation (MCDC) initiative.  In all, 72 underwriters (comprising 96% of the municipal underwriting market) have been charged under the voluntary self-reporting program which targets material misstatements and omissions in municipal bond offering documents.  The settling firms and civil penalties paid by the settling firms are as follows: Barclays Capital Inc. ($500,000), Boenning & Scattergood Inc. ($250,000), D.A. Davidson & Co. ($500,000), First Midstate Inc. ($100,000), Hilltop Securities Inc. ($360,000), Janney Montgomery Scott LLC ($500,000), Jefferies LLC ($500,000), KeyBanc Capital Markets Inc. ($440,000), Mitsubishi UFJ Securities  (USA) Inc. ($20,000), Municipal Capital Markets Group Inc. ($60,000), Roosevelt & Cross Inc. ($250,0000), TD Securities (USA) LLC ($500,000), United Bankers’ Bank ($160,000), and Wells Fargo Bank N.A. Municipal Products Group ($440,000).  SEC