Securities Industry Commentator by Bill Singer Esq

July 13, 2021




Currency Exchange Manager Sentenced to One Year for Filing False Transaction Reports in Connection with Scheme to Defraud Philadelphia Wholesale Produce Market (DOJ Release)

Long Island Resident Pleads Guilty to Multimillion-Dollar Elder Fraud Scheme (DOJ Release)


Wasted Time By FINRA Regulatory Notice (BrokeAndBroker.com Blog)

https://www.sec.gov/news/press-release/2021-123
-and-
https://ag.ny.gov/press-release/2021/attorney-general-james-announces-97-million-restitution-tiaa-customers-misled

Without admitting or denying the findings in an SEC Order 
https://www.sec.gov/litigation/admin/2021/33-10954.pd, TIAA-CREF Individual & Institutional Services LLC ("TC Services"), a subsidiary of Teachers Insurance and Annuity Association of America ("TIAA") agreed to cease and desist from committing or causing any future violations of these provisions, be censured, and pay disgorgement, prejudgment interest, and a civil penalty totaling $97 million that will be distributed to investors through a Fair Fund. The SEC's Order finds that TC Services willfully violated Sections 17(a)(2) and 17(a)(3) of the Securities Act and Sections 206(2) and 206(4) of the Investment Advisers Act of 1940 and Rule 206(4)-7 thereunder. The New York State Attorney General announced a parallel action, which is also settled by the $87 million payment. As alleged in part in the SEC Release;

[F]rom Jan. 1, 2013 through March 30, 2018, TC Services and its Wealth Management Advisers (WMAs) did not adequately disclose the full nature and extent of their conflicts of interest in recommending to clients that they roll over their retirement assets into a managed account program called "Portfolio Advisor."  The order finds that TC Services failed to adequately disclose compensation practices that incentivized the firm and its WMAs to recommend Portfolio Advisor for reasons other than a client's particular investment needs.  Further, TC Services trained its WMAs to make, and its WMAs made, representations that they offered "objective" and "non-commissioned" advice, "put the client first," and acted in the client's best interest while holding themselves out as fiduciaries.  This was misleading because TC Services' financial incentives for WMAs rendered their advice non-objective and TC Services did not ensure that WMA's recommendations were, in fact, in the best interest of its clients.  TC Services simultaneously applied continual pressure to compel WMAs to prioritize the rollover of ESP assets into Portfolio Advisor over lower cost alternatives.  The order also finds that TC Services failed to adopt and implement written policies and procedures reasonably designed to prevent violations of the Investment Advisers Act in connection with rollover recommendations. 

Also read:  NYAG "Assurance of Discontinuance"
https://ag.ny.gov/sites/default/files/tiaa_aod_-_2021.07.13_-_fully_executed.pdf
In part the NYAG Assurance asserts that:

27. Advisors also experienced supervisory pressure to sell Portfolio Advisor. For instance, one supervisor instructed his team that managed accounts "should be presented to 100%" of clients and that they were "the right fit for most if not all" TIAA clients. 

28. Advisors who identified clients with large amounts of investable assets were required to participate in "WHALE calls" with other Advisors and supervisors to discuss the client's situation and strategize ways to sell Portfolio Advisor or other TIAA products or accounts. Supervisors discouraged the option of clients directing their own investments and pushed Advisors to identify "pain points" that could make clients "uncomfortable" and motivate them to change their investment approach. Advisors also were required to report back to their supervisors about the outcome of the sales process for all opportunities presented on WHALE calls. 

29. Advisors' scorecards and progress toward their sales targets were tracked on internal TIAA databases and were visible to other Advisors and supervisors at all times. Advisors were ranked on their performance against the scorecard. Many supervisors for local or regional sales teams emailed their teams with weekly or monthly updates on sales rankings. Supervisors congratulated Advisors for the number or size of new Portfolio Advisor accounts and exhorted Advisors with fewer new managed accounts to increase their efforts. 

30. When Advisors failed to meet their sales goals, TIAA Services placed them on performance improvement plans. A significant number of Advisors who were put on performance improvement plans resigned from TIAA Services rather than face potential termination. On the other hand, when Advisors met or exceeded their annual sales goals, TIAA Services increased those goals for the following year, resulting in consistent pressure to increase production and asset growth.

. . .


45. Most significantly, TIAA has made two major changes that impact rollovers from employer-sponsored plans to Portfolio Advisor. First, in June 2020, prior to the implementation of the SEC's Regulation Best Interest, TIAA announced that it would treat managed account rollover recommendations as an investment adviser service subject to a fiduciary duty. This transition eliminated the misleading "hat switch" between financial planning and recommendation of a managed account and established a single internal standard of conduct for all discussions of rollovers to managed accounts. Second, effective in 2021, TIAA has substantially revised its compensation policy to remove differential compensation between managed account sales and other retirement product sales.  

(BrokeAndBroker.com Blog)
http://www.brokeandbroker.com/5952/finra-arbitration-nonsolicitation/
At the heart of many employment and post-employment disputes is the belief by an employee that his discharge was fomented by a mere pretext. At times, an employer may cite misconduct as a legitimate basis for termination; however, at times, the cited misconduct was so inconsequential that it raises questions as to what else may be prompting the termination. In a recent FINRA Arbitration, a former employee says that his termination was unreasonable and solely prompted by his employer's desire to reduce its salary expenses. Before the arbitrators was the issue of whether the former employer would be permitted to enforce a non-solicitation agreement. 

https://www.advisorhub.com/no-total-ban-on-non-competes-expected-despite-biden-executive-order/
The Biden Administration's recently published "Executive Order on Promoting Competition in the American Economy" has caught the attention of Wall Street's financial services firms, and going by their initial reaction, they're worried. Banks, brokerage firms, and funds have benefitted for decades via non-compete and non-solicit provisions in their employment agreements, but those restraints have finally (and thankfully) come within the crosshairs of advocates for fair-play in the workplace. AdvisorHub's Miriam Rozen is covering this developing issue and offers quotes from those who support the retention of this restraints and those who call for their elimination (or reduction). 

https://www.justice.gov/usao-edpa/pr/currency-exchange-manager-sentenced-one-year-filing-false-transaction-reports
Thomas Del Borrello, 42, pled guilty in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania to an Information dharging him with filing false Currency Transaction Reports (CTRs) and failing to file CTRs for cash transactions in excess of $10,000; and he was sentenced to one year in prison plus two years of supervised release, andordered to pay a $5,000 fine. The DOJ Release describes a scheme involving the Philadelphia Wholesale Produce Market as allegedly perpetrated by the Market's President and Chief Executive Officer Caesar DiCrecchio. As alleged in part in the DOJ Release:.

[D]el Borrello was a supervisor at United Check Cashing on South Broad Street in Philadelphia and, as such, was responsible for compliance with regulations governing cash transactions, including the preparation and filing of CTRs.

Del Borrello regularly cashed checks for Caesar DiCrecchio, who has pleaded guilty to defrauding the Market while serving as its President and CEO. As part of his guilty plea, DiCrecchio admitted regularly causing groups of checks to be delivered to, and cashed at, United Check Cashing. These checks were each made out for less than $10,000, but when cashed as a group generated in excess of $10,000 in United States currency. For these cash transactions in excess of $10,000, regulations require the currency exchange to file a CTR, recording the identity of the person who presented the transaction. Del Borrello caused the filing of false CTRs which hid DiCrecchio's identity, or caused United Check Cashing to fail to file a CTR altogether. On some occasions, DiCrecchio directed Del Borrello to convert the proceeds of the checks into separate money orders which were used to pay the $14,167 monthly rent for DiCrecchio's Stone Harbor house. Del Borrello's corrupt actions permitted DiCrecchio to remain undetected while he perpetrated the $7 million fraud on the Market.

https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/long-island-resident-pleads-guilty-multimillion-dollar-elder-fraud-scheme
Lorraine Chalavoutis, 64, pled guilty in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of New York to conspiracy to commit mail fraud. As alleged in part in the DOJ Release, Chalavoutis:

conspired to mail fraudulent prize notices to thousands of victims throughout the United States between December 2010 and July 2016. The mailings appeared to be personally addressed to thousands of individuals whose names were on consumer lists obtained by Chalavoutis and her primary co-conspirators, Shaun Sullivan and Tully Lovisa. Chalavoutis created various shell companies for the purported senders of the mailings, and hid her co-conspirators' involvement in the business by using straw owners. Lovisa and Sullivan both pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit mail fraud and are awaiting sentencing. In separate cases, several other defendants have also pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit mail fraud in connection with the scheme.

SEC Denies Award to Whistleblower
Order Determining Whistleblower Award Claim ('34 Act Release No. 34-92375; Whistleblower Award Proc. File No. 2021-70)
https://www.sec.gov/rules/other/2021/34-92375.pdf
The SEC's Claims Review Staff ("CRS") issued a Preliminary Determination recommending the denial of a Whistleblower Award to Claimant, who contested the denial. The Commission ordered that Claimant's application be denied. The Order asserts in part that [Ed: footnotes omitted]:

Claimant maintains that internal* * *  reporting to * * * former employer beginning in * * *  and the employer's subsequent reporting of this information to the Commission makes * * * eligible to receive a whistleblower award. Rule 21F-4{b)(7) provides that if an individual reports allegations of possible wrongdoing to an entity and then, "within 120 days, submit[s] the same information to the Commission pursuant to §240.21F-9," the Commission will consider that the individual provided the information to the Commission as of the date it was fast provided to the entity. Even if Claimant internally reported before receiving the Commission's request for an interview in * * * , that internal report occurred years prior to the request from the Commission and thus Claimant cannot avail Redacted of the Rule 21F-4(b) 120-day lookback provision. Accordingly, the effective date of * * * submission of information to the Commission is Redacted not * * * which is subsequent to the request from the Commission. 

Here, it is undisputed that Commission staff contacted Claimant's former employer in Redacted to request an interview with Claimant, and that Claimant was interviewed by the Commission's and other agencies' staff before Claimant submitted * * * Form TCR to the Commission in Redacted. It is further undisputed that the interview related to the subject matter of Claimant's later tip. We thus find that Claimant's submission of information to the Commission was not done voluntarily and, therefore, Claimant does not qualify for a whistleblower award. 

Wasted Time By FINRA Regulatory Notice (BrokeAndBroker.com Blog)
http://www.brokeandbroker.com/5944/finra-regulatory-notice/
FINRA's lackluster Board of Governors demonstrates no interest in prompting a more aggressive and effective regulatory protocol. By design or default, FINRA's Board is socially engineering an industry dominated by fewer, large firms and endangered by too many shady, smaller ones. It is the worst of both worlds where power is unchecked and fraud tolerated. Instead of formulating an effective regulatory agenda that combines more timely retroactive enforcement with proactive antifraud efforts, FINRA persists in offering a simulacrum of regulation. Among FINRA's worst sins is that it is an organization for which everything, no matter how inconsequential or half-assed, prompts a press release or formal notice. Worse, the endless stream of useless communications are routed to compliance professionals, whose time is wasted by being forced to read about nothing of value.