- cypherpunks - lists.cpunks.org

SEC Sued Over FINRA's One-Day Bond Reporting Timeline
by Gunnar Larson 19 Nov '24

19 Nov '24

SEC Sued Over FINRA's One-Day Bond Reporting Timeline <https://www.law360.com/compliance/articles/2262431?nl_pk=ab5ce197-c1fb-4d8e…> By Jessica Corso The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission has been hit with a lawsuit seeking to overturn a newly adopted rule that will require brokerage firms to report bond transactions more quickly, with the suing organization previously claiming there was no evidence justifying a need for such a change. Petition attached | Read full article » <https://www.law360.com/compliance/articles/2262431?nl_pk=ab5ce197-c1fb-4d8e…> | Save to favorites » <https://www.law360.com/compliance/articles/2262431?nl_pk=ab5ce197-c1fb-4d8e…>

1 1

BREAKING: Treasury Finalizes Partnership Tax Credit 'Direct Pay' Regs
by Gunnar Larson 19 Nov '24

19 Nov '24

BREAKING: Treasury Finalizes Partnership Tax Credit 'Direct Pay' Regs <https://www.law360.com/compliance/articles/2262661?nl_pk=ab5ce197-c1fb-4d8e…> By Kat Lucero The U.S. Treasury Department finalized regulations Tuesday to make it easier for tax-exempt entities with co-ownership in development projects to qualify for a direct cash payment of clean energy tax credits by electing out of their partnership tax status. Final Rule attached | Read full article » <https://www.law360.com/compliance/articles/2262661?nl_pk=ab5ce197-c1fb-4d8e…> | Save to favorites » <https://www.law360.com/compliance/articles/2262661?nl_pk=ab5ce197-c1fb-4d8e…>

1 0

Trump’s Nominees Are Being Hand-Picked to Enact a Dangerous Platform the Koch Brothers Made Public 44 Years Ago
by Gunnar Larson 19 Nov '24

19 Nov '24

https://wallstreetonparade.com/2024/11/trumps-nominees-are-being-hand-picke… By Pam Martens and Russ Martens: November 19, 2024 ~ President-Elect Donald Trump/ Charles Koch Tens of millions of Americans rise each morning and pray they are awakening from a bad dream about the President-elect’s plans to put a plethora of outrageously unfit people in charge of critical federal agencies that protect the air we breathe, the water we drink, the food we feed our children, our ability to obtain healthcare, social security for the elderly, response to disasters and so forth. What few Americans understand is that this plan is very real, dead serious, and was hatched 44 years ago by two fossil fuel billionaire brothers – Charles and David Koch. The plan was publicly released as the Libertarian Platform when David Koch ran for Vice President of the United States in 1980. David Koch died in 2019, leaving his brother, Charles, who turned 89 this month, to relentlessly push to install the platform, notwithstanding that his past fossil fuel policies have played a key role in heating the earth to the point of no return, causing unprecedented wild fires and drought in New York City at this very moment – as well as hundreds of deaths from unprecedented flash flooding here in the U.S. and around the globe this year. To understand the dangerous agenda behind Trump’s nominees, consider what was written in that 1980 Platform: “We support the abolition of the Environmental Protection Agency.” “We support abolition of the Department of Energy.” “We call for the dissolution of all government agencies concerned with transportation, including the Department of Transportation.” “We advocate the abolition of the Federal Aviation Administration.” “We advocate the abolition of the Food and Drug Administration.” “We support an end to all subsidies for child-bearing built into our present laws, including all welfare plans and the provision of tax-supported services for children.” “We oppose all government welfare, relief projects, and ‘aid to the poor’ programs. All these government programs are privacy-invading, paternalistic, demeaning, and inefficient. The proper source of help for such persons is the voluntary efforts of private groups and individuals.” “We call for the privatization of the inland waterways, and of the distribution system that brings water to industry, agriculture and households.” “We call for the repeal of the Occupational Safety and Health Act.” “We call for the abolition of the Consumer Product Safety Commission.” “We support the repeal of all state usury laws.” “We urge the repeal of federal campaign finance laws, and the immediate abolition of the despotic Federal Election Commission.” “We favor the abolition of Medicare and Medicaid programs.” “We oppose any compulsory insurance or tax-supported plan to provide health services, including those which finance abortion services.” “We favor the repeal of the fraudulent, virtually bankrupt, and increasingly oppressive Social Security system. Pending that repeal, participation in Social Security should be made voluntary.” “We oppose all personal and corporate income taxation, including capital gains taxes.” “We support the eventual repeal of all taxation.” “As an interim measure, all criminal and civil sanctions against tax evasion should be terminated immediately.” “We support repeal of all law which impede the ability of any person to find employment, such as minimum wage laws.” To quote Senator Bernie Sanders, “The agenda of the Koch brothers is to repeal every major piece of legislation that has been signed into law over the past 80 years that has protected the middle class, the elderly, the children, the sick, and the most vulnerable in this country.” After decades of floundering on implementing their agenda, the Kochs finally realized that the key to moving the agenda forward was to first accomplish the stated goal of “the repeal of federal campaign finance laws” so that billionaire money could control who gets elected to public office. That was accomplished under the Supreme Court’s Citizens United in 2010, and its progeny, ushering in unlimited corporate and billionaire spending in elections. Americans have been losing ground to the dark Koch agenda ever since. According to research at the Washington Post, megadonors plowed $2.5 billion into the current election cycle – twice the amount they contributed in the 2020 election cycle. Americans got a peek at Charles Koch’s plans for the dystopian future of the U.S. during Trump’s first term in office. The campaign funding mechanism Koch used back then was known as Freedom Partners. In a document titled “Roadmap to Repeal: Removing Regulatory Barriers to Opportunity,” the Koch front group listed the laws and regulations it expected to be repealed in the first 100 days of his administration. And like a dutiful courtier, the Trump administration responded quickly. Repeal the Paris Climate Accord – done. Tax cuts for corporations and the wealthy – done. Gutting federal regulations at the Environmental Protection Agency – done. Appointing industry shills to run federal agencies – done. In addition, Freedom Partners funneled its own staff into key jobs in the Trump administration to hasten the enactment of its agenda. Charles Koch has spent the better part of his adult life planning his assault on the federal government and gradually implementing the components he needs to succeed. As we have previously written, those include the following: Meeting secretly with big political donors twice a year to plot a coordinated strategy to put their chosen people in public office; Meeting at his private club with a sitting Supreme Court justice who will then rule on key legislation that benefits his interests; Funding an organization that then sluices money to the wife of the Supreme Court Justice; Running a highly sophisticated voter registration database, data mining and get-out-the-vote operation called i360, in order to pack Congress with people who will pursue an antiregulatory agenda; Installing dozens of its lawyers and operatives into the highest offices of the federal government; Running a sprawling, opaque trading operation that could potentially be raising the prices of the fossil fuel products it sells via the futures market; Funding a sprawling network of taxpayer-subsidized front groups to deny climate change and foment hate; Providing funding to groups involved in sending a mob to attack the seat of the federal government on January 6, 2021; Funding groups that use dark money and propaganda to put lifetime justices on the highest court and to promote legislation friendly to the fossil fuels conglomerate. History will not be kind to those who downplay this threat or enable it through their silence.

1 0

Trump Makes Second Attempt to Install Wall Street’s Lawyer, Jay Clayton, to Oversee Prosecutions of Wall Street
by Gunnar Larson 19 Nov '24

19 Nov '24

https://wallstreetonparade.com/2024/11/trump-makes-second-attempt-to-instal… By Pam Martens and Russ Martens: November 18, 2024 ~ Trump, Pied PiperLast week President-elect Donald Trump announced the nomination of Jay Clayton to become U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York – the regional office of the U.S. Department of Justice that brings (or passes on bringing) criminal prosecutions against the Wall Street megabanks for their serial looting of the American people. In Trump’s first term as President, Clayton was tapped by Trump to serve as Chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission – notwithstanding that Clayton had represented 8 of the 10 largest Wall Street banks in the prior three years as a law partner at Sullivan & Cromwell, one of the oldest Wall Street go-to law firms. Clayton returned to Sullivan & Cromwell after his stint at the SEC and currently serves there as Senior Policy Advisor and Of Counsel. When Clayton’s name was first announced by Trump to be SEC Chair in early January 2017, Senator Sherrod Brown, then the Democrat’s ranking member of the Senate Banking Committee, issued the following statement: “It’s hard to see how an attorney who’s spent his career helping Wall Street beat the rap will keep President-elect Trump’s promise to stop big banks and hedge funds from ‘getting away with murder.’ I look forward to hearing how Mr. Clayton will protect retirees and savers from being exploited, demand real accountability from the financial institutions the SEC oversees, and work to prevent another financial crisis.” Our Revolution, the organization created by supporters of Senator Bernie Sanders after his failed bid for the Presidency, ramped up the heat against Clayton serving as SEC Chair with an email blast asking Sanders’ supporters to sign a petition against Clayton. The email message read in part: “Clayton’s ties to Wall Street are deep. His law firm specializes in protecting Wall Street banks, and during the financial crisis he worked as a bailout attorney for Goldman Sachs, where his wife works today…The SEC chair is supposed to referee Wall Street banks, but Clayton has spent his entire career protecting their interests – and more than half of his family income currently comes from one of them. How can he be trusted to suddenly switch sides and put working Americans first?” The link to the petition called this a “hostile takeover” of America. That hostile takeover now looks like a warm, cuddly blanket compared to what Trump is unleashing today. Saturday Night Live’s James Austin Johnson, playing Trump, described his cabinet picks as follows: “…I am very fastly picking the most epic cabinet of all time. They’re some of the most dynamic, free-thinking, animal killing, sexually criminal, medically crazy people in the country.” Saturday Night Live forgot to reference Fox News host Pete Hegseth, the man Trump has nominated to be Secretary of Defense and head the U.S. military and Pentagon, despite his tattoos espousing white supremacy rhetoric. Most notable about the current Trump nomination of Clayton is that this is not the first time that Trump has attempted to put this deeply conflicted man – who has zero experience as a criminal prosecutor – in charge of the federal prosecutor’s office that handles criminal prosecutions of Wall Street. The first time was more of an attempted coup d’état rather than an appointment. Here are the hubristic details of what went down with Clayton in Trump’s last year in office as President – six months before Trump fueled the insurrection on the U.S. Capitol building on January 6, 2021. Shortly after 9 p.m. on June 19, 2020, the then U.S. Attorney General, William Barr, blindsided prosecutors in the Southern District of New York with the announcement that their boss, Geoffrey Berman, was stepping down as U.S. Attorney and would be replaced with the sitting SEC Chairman, Jay Clayton. What Barr had not foreseen was that Berman had no intention of being ousted quietly. In fact, he would later write a tell-all book on the experience. Berman writes the following in Holding the Line: Inside the Nation’s Preeminent US Attorney’s Office and Its Battle with the Trump Justice Department: “Throughout my tenure as U.S. attorney, Trump’s Justice Department kept demanding that I use my office to aid them politically, and I kept declining — in ways just tactful enough to keep me from being fired.” Two hours after Barr’s announcement, Geoffrey Berman released his own statement indicating that the U.S. Attorney General had just told a brazen lie to the American people. Berman’s statement was this: “I learned in a press release from the Attorney General tonight that I was ‘stepping down’ as United States Attorney. I have not resigned, and have no intention of resigning my position, to which I was appointed by the Judges of the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York.” The next day, Barr issued another statement indicating that President Trump was removing Berman from his post but would leave Berman’s Deputy in charge of the office on an interim basis. Barr had stated the prior Friday evening that he would be putting in Craig Carpenito, the sitting U.S. Attorney for the District of New Jersey, as acting head of the office until Clayton’s confirmation hearing. The acknowledgement by Barr that Berman’s Deputy would fill the post until a confirmation occurred appeased Berman and he agreed to step down. The same day, then Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Lindsey Graham, Republican of South Carolina, released a statement indicating that he would not move forward on Clayton’s nomination without the standard policy of getting a go-ahead from the two Senators of the state where the new U.S. Attorney will serve, i.e., New York. That meant that Senators Chuck Schumer and Kirsten Gillibrand would have to give the greenlight to Clayton. Instead, Schumer released the following statement: “Forty seven years ago, Elliott Richardson had the courage to say no to a gross abuse of presidential power. Jay Clayton has a similar choice today: He can allow himself to be used in the brazen Trump-Barr scheme to interfere in investigations by the U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York, or he can stand up to this corruption, withdraw his name from consideration, and save his own reputation from overnight ruin.” According to the New York Times, Senator Gillibrand had also stated that Clayton should withdraw his name from consideration. That was the end of the Trump-Barr-Clayton attempted coup d’état on June 19, 2020. It was followed by the violent and deadly attempted coup d’état on January 6, 2021 at the Capitol building. Now Trump’s plan to install Clayton in the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York is back and, incredibly, Clayton looks like one of the more reasonable Trump cabinet picks – on the mere basis that he hasn’t been accused of sexually assaulting anyone or having his body decorated with white supremacy images. What Trump is attempting to do for Wall Street’s serial miscreants today is precisely what he is planning to do for himself at Main Justice – the U.S. Department of Justice in Washington, D.C. Trump has nominated his sycophant, Matt Gaetz, to be U.S. Attorney General and his defense counsel, Todd Blanche, to be Deputy Attorney General, a position that oversees the criminal division of the U.S. Department of Justice. Blanche represented Trump in the federal cases brought by Special Counsel Jack Smith and in the New York case where Trump was accused of attempting to illegally influence the 2016 election by paying hush money to porn star Stormy Daniels, who testified in court that the two had sex in a hotel room. According to Daniels’ statements to the media, Trump’s wife, Melania, was caring for their four-month old son, Barron, at the time. The hush money trial ended with Trump being convicted on all 34 criminal felony counts – making him the first convicted felon in U.S. history to be elected President of the United States. In the 2020 effort by Trump to install Clayton, mainstream media focused on the fact that the U.S. Attorney’s office for the Southern District was actively investigating Trump ally, Rudy Giuliani, and Deutsche Bank, a major financial lender to Trump’s companies. That might have been relevant. But also noteworthy was the ongoing criminal investigations of two Wall Street megabanks. Goldman Sachs was under investigation in one of the biggest financial frauds in history – a case involving a Malaysian sovereign wealth fund known as 1MDB. Goldman raised over $6 billion in bond offerings for 1MDB but, according to the Justice Department, $4.5 billion of that was “misappropriated” and used “to fund the co-conspirators’ lavish lifestyles, including purchases of artwork and jewelry, the acquisition of luxury real estate and luxury yachts, the payment of gambling expenses, and the hiring of musicians and celebrities to attend parties.” Goldman made more than $600 million in fees from the bond offerings, according to the Justice Department. On June 6, 2020 Reuters reported that Malaysia would not accept $3 billion from Goldman to settle the case. On June 11 – just eight days before Berman was abruptly dismissed from his post — the New York Times reported the following: “Goldman Sachs is trying to get federal prosecutors to ease up on the bank for its role in a brazen scheme to loot billions of dollars from a Malaysian sovereign wealth fund. “Lawyers for the bank have asked Deputy Attorney General Jeffrey Rosen to review demands by some federal prosecutors that Goldman pay more than $2 billion in fines and plead guilty to a felony charge, according to three people briefed on the matter. “The bank has sought to pay a lower fine and avoid a guilty plea, according to the people, who spoke on condition of anonymity because the talks are continuing.” What most Americans have never heard about in this famous case is that Clayton’s law firm, Sullivan & Cromwell, was involved in making some of those luxury purchases on behalf of the gang of alleged criminals who looted 1MDB, according to the U.S. Department of Justice. Sullivan & Cromwell’s name makes seven appearances in the criminal complaint filed in court by the Justice Department. While Sullivan & Cromwell is named 7 times in the complaint, the giant law firm Shearman & Sterling is mentioned 94 times. Shearman & Sterling has represented Goldman Sachs and other Wall Street banks on numerous occasions. Something else that the public does not know is that a unit of JPMorgan Chase, a bank that has pleaded guilty to five criminal felony counts, is named 61 times in the 1MDB complaint for its role in wiring the looted funds. While the Justice Department did not bring charges against J.P. Morgan in the matter, the Swiss regulator, FINMA, found in 2017 that the bank had committed serious anti-money laundering breaches in its handling of monies belonging to 1MDB. Just three months after the attempted Clayton coup, the U.S. Department of Justice gave JPMorgan Chase a deferred prosecution agreement for two criminal felony counts involving sprawling crimes in the trading of precious metals and U.S. Treasuries. But instead of the case being brought by the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York – where JPMorgan’s trading desks are located – the case was inexplicably handled by the District of Connecticut.

1 1

Fwd: Update: Bank.org Baby Bond One Sheet
by Gunnar Larson 19 Nov '24

19 Nov '24

---------- Forwarded message --------- From: Gunnar Larson <g(a)xny.io> Date: Mon, Jun 26, 2023, 3:17 PM Subject: Update: Bank.org Baby Bond One Sheet To: Richard Humphrey <rhumphrey(a)experiencetheride.com> Cc: Gunnar Larson <g(a)xny.io> Hey Richard: From our Bank.org Baby Bond Fund one sheet (attached) sent to you on Friday, I spent the weekend organizing some highlights (below) for our upcoming conversations together. For Bank.org, the large-dollar history of investment banking serves as the backdrop for our large-dollar Bank.org Baby Bond Fund proposal. This history also shines light on why I say there is very little that separates the asset field in the end, and why uniting feels attainable and the best thing. In many ways, the main point of the Bank.org Baby Bond Fund is summarized three papers below. All share the same origin story and much of what is coming to fruition with xNY.io - Bank.org. *Collating these highlights should make Bank.org appear even more reasonable as well as possible:* - 85 highlights to "Children’s Savings Accounts and Baby Bonds Share a Similar Origin Story": https://drive.google.com/file/d/17qXJm10bKYpEV1X7Pg4H5UEq8sGbgLrE/view?usp=… - 44 highlights to "A Brighter Future With Baby Bonds": https://drive.google.com/file/d/17qt7WFzYIgZL4VMTC4A-TzyjxdZoWlK0/view?usp=… - 188 highlights to "Brookings Global Economy and Development, Using Impact Bonds to Achieve Development": https://drive.google.com/file/d/17u8w3J_pKcF9gSZW0bSf6JdVSnC3yobE/view?usp=… Moreover, immediately with our experiences in New York with cross-border cryptocurrencies ... I aim to harness a positive narrative surrounding the Bank.org Baby Bond Fund. A cohesive narrative championed by thr common origin story behind crypto. And, many of the same key principles that made crypto fail. This common narrative at xNY.io - Bank.org is harder to tear apart given our market position currently. Richard, are you free to meet on Wednesday or Thursday? I can take the ferry out to catch up. Let me know what works best for you. Hope you have a great 👍 day! Thank you, Gunnar -- Gunnar Larson xNY.io | Bank.org MSc - Digital Currency MBA - Entrepreneurship and Innovation (ip) G(a)xNY.io +1-917-580-8053 New York, New York 10001

1 0

AECOM Calls FCA Suit Alleging False Army Billing 'Meritless'
by Gunnar Larson 19 Nov '24

19 Nov '24

AECOM Calls FCA Suit Alleging False Army Billing 'Meritless' <https://www.law360.com/governmentcontracts/articles/2262234?nl_pk=4126fe73-…> By Daniel Wilson AECOM has pushed to end a False Claims Act suit alleging that it falsely billed the U.S. Army on a $1.9 billion support deal, saying the whistleblower who filed the suit hadn't shown that his remaining allegations were material to the government. 2 documents attached | Read full article » <https://www.law360.com/governmentcontracts/articles/2262234?nl_pk=4126fe73-…> | Save to favorites » <https://www.law360.com/governmentcontracts/articles/2262234?nl_pk=4126fe73-…>

1 0

Chancery Consolidates 2 Musk, Derivative Damage Suits
by Gunnar Larson 19 Nov '24

19 Nov '24

Chancery Consolidates 2 Musk, Derivative Damage Suits <https://www.law360.com/delaware/articles/2262012?nl_pk=8f2e5a76-bb66-462b-a…> By Jeff Montgomery Delaware's chancellor on Monday combined two class suits that separately targeted Elon Musk's massive sales of Tesla Inc. stock and alleged diversions of Tesla talent to Musk's spun-off artificial intelligence venture, while ordering coordination with a suit seeking damages arising from alleged insider trading in late 2022. 3 documents attached | Read full article » <https://www.law360.com/delaware/articles/2262012?nl_pk=8f2e5a76-bb66-462b-a…> | Save to favorites » <https://www.law360.com/delaware/articles/2262012?nl_pk=8f2e5a76-bb66-462b-a…>

1 0

Meta Can Ditch Mike Huckabee's CBD Fake Ad Suit
by Gunnar Larson 19 Nov '24

19 Nov '24

Meta Can Ditch Mike Huckabee's CBD Fake Ad Suit <https://www.law360.com/delaware/articles/2262258?nl_pk=8f2e5a76-bb66-462b-a…> By Jonathan Capriel Former Arkansas governor and conservative pundit Mike Huckabee can't sue Facebook after an unidentified company posted advertisements implying he endorsed a brand of CBD gummies, a Delaware federal judge ruled Monday, saying he can't prove the social media giant was actually aware the ads were bogus. Order attached | Read full article » <https://www.law360.com/delaware/articles/2262258?nl_pk=8f2e5a76-bb66-462b-a…> | Save to favorites » <https://www.law360.com/delaware/articles/2262258?nl_pk=8f2e5a76-bb66-462b-a…>

1 0

Netgear Says Huawei Engaging In Global Patent 'Warfare'
by Gunnar Larson 19 Nov '24

19 Nov '24

Netgear Says Huawei Engaging In Global Patent 'Warfare' <https://www.law360.com/technology/articles/2262151?nl_pk=2bd720dd-746c-4744…> By Hannah Albarazi Router maker Netgear urged a California federal judge Monday to hold a mini-trial to determine a reasonable royalty rate for licensing Wi-Fi technology patents from Huawei, which Netgear claims is engaging in anticompetitive behavior and a "scorched earth worldwide litigation campaign" to extract excessive royalties. Motion attached | Read full article » <https://www.law360.com/technology/articles/2262151?nl_pk=2bd720dd-746c-4744…> | Save to favorites » <https://www.law360.com/technology/articles/2262151?nl_pk=2bd720dd-746c-4744…>

1 0

Meta, Netflix Shook Hands On Illicit Streaming Deal, Suit Says
by Gunnar Larson 19 Nov '24

19 Nov '24

Meta, Netflix Shook Hands On Illicit Streaming Deal, Suit Says <https://www.law360.com/technology/articles/2262483?nl_pk=2bd720dd-746c-4744…> By Lauren Berg Meta Platforms and Netflix made an unlawful agreement where the social media giant would cede the video-streaming market to Netflix by hobbling its competing service and the streaming giant would funnel its customers' data to boost Facebook's advertising algorithms, according to a proposed class action filed Monday in Illinois federal court. Complaint attached | Read full article » <https://www.law360.com/technology/articles/2262483?nl_pk=2bd720dd-746c-4744…> | Save to favorites » <https://www.law360.com/technology/articles/2262483?nl_pk=2bd720dd-746c-4744…>

1 0