The Securities and Exchange Commission recently brought its first two enforcement actions against issuers of non-fungible tokens (NFTs), resulting in cease-and-desist orders, penalties and other remedies, finding that the NFTs were investment contracts and that each of the issuers had
Judge Analisa Torres’ greatly anticipated Order in the SEC’s lawsuit against Ripple is a split decision. The Order basically finds that Ripple’s digital token XRP is a security when sold privately to individuals and institutional investors pursuant to purchase agreements,
The anti-child trafficking thriller “Sound of Freedom” just opened in theatres on July 4th. Based on a true story, it stars Jim Caviezal as former Homeland Security special agent Tim Ballard who quits his job with the agency and embarks
In the world of venture capital, there are certain investor rights that ensure the smooth execution of exit transactions. The primary such mechanism is the drag-along provision, under which one group of stockholders agrees in advance to sell or vote
A major theme of this Blog has always been ongoing legislative, regulatory and market initiatives to reform capital markets by targeting unreasonable or outdated impediments to capital formation to make it easier for early-stage companies to raise capital. These impediments
The collapse of Silicon Valley Bank will have enormous repercussions for startups and VCs in ways seen and unseen. As for the unseen, SVB had deep relationships among the various players in the venture ecosystem. Founders and investors established banking
A new federal law goes into effect March 29, 2023 that conditionally exempts from broker-dealer registration persons who solely intermediate small, private company M&A deals. Persons who intermediate larger private company M&A transactions will not be eligible for the new
Will employment non-competes soon be banned nationally? Perhaps, if the Federal Trade Commission gets its way. Last month, the FTC issued a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (the “NPRM”) that would prohibit just about all employment non-competes. The proposal is now
“Never in my career have I seen such a complete failure of corporate controls and such a complete absence of trustworthy financial information as occurred here.” Such was the lament of John Ray, the legendary restructuring executive tasked with
Just last week, special purpose acquisition company The Music Acquisition Corporation (“TMAC”) called a special meeting of its stockholders. It wasn’t the special meeting it originally envisioned. TMAC was launched in February 2021 by long-time Geffen Records President Neil Jacobson