Articles by Janell

FINRA has fined Morgan Stanley Smith Barney $1 million and ordered another $371,000 in restitution and interest to customers for excessive markups and markdowns charged to customers on corporate and municipal bond transactions as well as other supervision violations.

The SEC has ordered Broker-dealer FTN Financial Securities to pay nearly $2 million for allowing a registered investment advisor, Sentinel Management, to defraud its clients through a reverse repurchase transaction.

The Chase unit recommended risky investments to unsophisticated investors with little or no risk tolerance, FINRA said.

Leaders of the Financial Services Institute expressed cautious optimism about their efforts to dilute or derail an initiative under way at the Department of Labor to broaden the scope of the term "fiduciary", a top policy priority for the advocacy organization.

Wachovia Bank, NA, currently Wells Fargo & Co., has reached a tentative settlement of a class action suit with municipal issuers over antitrust charges of bid-rigging for municipal investment, derivatives and other contracts.

SEC Fines UBS $8 Million for Bad Recordkeeping

UBS Securities has once again been penalized for its improper handeling of short sales. This fine from the SEC is for $8 million and a $12 million fine was imposed by FINRA less than two weeks ago.

FINRA Fines UBS $300,000

UBS Financial Services, Inc. was fined $300,000 by FINRA for failing to supervise and prevent excessive crosstrading of municipal securities between the customer accounts of one broker for a two-year period.