Securities Industry

The Securities and Exchange Commission on Friday threw out a lifetime securities industry ban by the NASD against Frank Quattrone, four days after a federal appeals court overturned the former star investment banker's 2004 conviction on obstruction and witness tampering charges. The SEC said the NASD, the securities industry's self-regulatory arm, "did not act in accordance with its own rules" in issuing the ban in November 2004.

The price of silver hit its highest level in more than 22 years Tuesday, after U.S. regulators paved the way for an exchange-traded mutual fund that would invest directly in the metal. The Securities and Exchange Commission said it approved rule changes that would allow the American Stock Exchange to list shares in Barclays' proposed iShares Silver Trust. Speculators bid up silver futures, betting that the fund could mean heavy new demand for the metal.

Japanese government officials Thursday sharply criticized the Tokyo Stock Exchange for its inability to cope with a surge of stock sales triggered by an investigation of a popular Internet company's financial dealings. "A stock exchange that can't carry on trading simply doesn't deserve to exist," Economy Minister Kaoru Yosano said in a nationally televised news conference. "The exchange should make it a top priority to bring business back to normal."

Wall Street firms will pay their New York City workers a record $21.5 billion in bonuses for 2005 amid soaring profits, state Comptroller Alan Hevesi forecast Wednesday. The average bonus for the city's 174,000 investment bankers and other securities industry workers will rise 10% to $125,500, also a record, Hevesi said. Total bonuses will rise 15.5%, surpassing the previous record of $19.5 billion set in 2000.

The flat stock market of 2005 helped bring at least one benefit to corporate America: a decline in securities class-action suits, according to a study released Tuesday. The number of such suits dropped 17% to 176 last year, the lowest total since 1997, according to an annual report by Boston-based Cornerstone Research and Stanford Law School. The highest number in recent years, 239 suits, came in 1998.

The brokerage industry's chief regulatory group said Tuesday it collected a record $125.4 million in disciplinary fines this year, 21% more than in 2004, for violations including abuses in sales of mutual funds and variable annuities. The Washington-based NASD also said it filed 1,412 enforcement actions in 2005, up 1% from the previous year, and barred or suspended 737 people from the securities industry, down 12%. It closed 9,150 arbitration cases and 1,700 mediation cases.

The skippers of the $7-billion Clipper mutual fund in Beverly Hills are abandoning ship, after two years of lagging performance. Managers James Gipson, Michael Sandler and Bruce Veaco, who have run the value-oriented stock fund since the mid-1980s, are leaving at the end of the year, the fund's parent company said Friday. Gipson, 62, is the founder of Pacific Financial Research Inc., the entity that serves as advisor to the Clipper and Clipper Focus funds.

Refusing to back down, a divided Securities and Exchange Commission on Wednesday passed for the second time a rule requiring independent stewardship of the nation's mutual funds -- just one week after an appeals court had ordered the agency to reconsider the measure. The SEC's swift answer to the court came over the objections of business groups and was among the final official actions of Chairman William H.

The Securities and Exchange Commission has narrowed its probe of Los Angeles-based American Funds to the question of whether the firm overpaid brokerages for trades as a reward for mutual fund sales, according to people familiar with the inquiry. The fund giant already is fighting two other regulatory agencies over charges of improper practices.

Peter N. Brant, who pleaded guilty in 1984 to insider trading using advance knowledge of Wall Street Journal stories, has agreed to pay $3.2 million to settle allegations that he violated a securities industry ban and defrauded clients. The Securities and Exchange Commission, in an order last week, said Brant acted illegally as an investment advisor, made speculative trades for clients against their wishes and turned over holdings in their accounts to generate more commissions.