SEC enforcement

Dick Lampen says the SEC charges against Dr. Phillip Frost, the firm’s primary shareholder, won’t affect its “significant” other resources.

Dr. Phillip Frost, the principal shareholder of the IBD network’s parent firm, has stepped down, giving way to CEO Richard Lampen.

The IBD’s advisors did not understand investments they sold to clients, the SEC says.

The agency says the biotech magnate and nine others made $27 million pumping up penny stocks.

The firm allegedly encouraged clients to use an affiliated investment advisor, and benefitted from the fees it charged them.

The SEC says the 33% owner of the parent of the IBD network participated in unlawful microcap stock sales resulting in “virtually worthless” investments.

In response to a Supreme Court ruling, the regulator will revisit 126 legal proceedings, including nearly two dozen advisor cases.

Joel N. Burstein allegedly helped his father-in-law defraud foreign investors hoping to immigrate to the U.S.

State Treasurer John Chiang says that Wells Fargo is keeping patterns of abuse hidden from view by resolving customer disputes through private arbitration.

The broker forged client signatures on annuity withdrawal requests and misled clients into making what they thought were tax payments, the SEC claims.

The advisor defrauded some 60 victims by using their money to pay off earlier investors, fund his own speculative trading and pay his personal expenses, the SEC claims.

“Our whistle-blower program is a critical component in our investor-protection toolbox,” SEC Chairman Jay Clayton says.

Other states are likely to enter similar agreements with the broker-dealer.

The advisor defrauded some 100 clients by persuading them to invest more than $71 million in 16 private funds offered by his two investment advisory companies, the SEC claims.

Co-chiefs of the SEC’s Division of Enforcement tout a program aimed at repaying investors for excessive mutual fund fees as a new approach to curbing industry abuses.

The funds paid for multiple vehicles, bedroom furniture and debts at casinos, prosecutors say.

The misconduct is so pervasive that the regulator is temporarily allowing violators to come forward.

The trade group cautions that the SEC could outsource advisor oversight due to low examination rates.

While some are mainstays, there are a few new ones to add to the list this year.

The second-largest independent broker-dealer overcharged nearly 1,800 retail retirement accounts, the regulator says.