UNITED STATES OF AMERICA

before the

SECURITIES AND EXCHANGE COMMISSION

INVESTMENT ADVISERS ACT OF 1940

Release No. 6554 / February 13, 2024

ADMINISTRATIVE PROCEEDING 

File No. 3-16706-rtv

ORDER DENYING REQUEST TO VACATE COLLATERAL BARS

On July 28, 2015, the Securities and Exchange Commission issued an order instituting 

administrative proceedings (“OIP”) against Sachin K. Uppal under Section 203(f) of the 

Investment Advisers Act of 1940.1 The OIP alleged that, in 2014, Uppal pleaded guilty in 

federal court to one count of wire fraud related to a scheme that involved Uppal, while acting as 

an investment adviser, defrauding investors by “soliciting millions of dollars of investment funds 

under false pretenses, failing to invest the money as promised, falsely reporting to investors that 

his purchases and sales of securities resulted in high rates of return to [his] fund, and 

misappropriating and converting investor funds to his own benefit without knowledge and 

authorization of investors.”2 The OIP further alleged that Uppal’s misconduct occurred between 

July 2007 and September 2013.

On December 1, 2015, an administrative law judge issued an initial decision that granted 

the Division of Enforcement’s motion for summary disposition and, among other things, barred

Uppal from association with any investment adviser, broker, dealer, municipal securities dealer, 

municipal advisor, transfer agent, or nationally recognized statistical rating organization, or 

1

Sachin K. Uppal, Advisers Act Release No. 4149, 2015 WL 4540449 (July 28, 2015).

2

Id., at *1.

In the Matter of

SACHIN K. UPPAL
2

municipal advisor (the “Initial Decision”).

3 After the time for filing for a petition for review 

expired, the Commission issued a notice that the initial decision had become final.4

In 2017, the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit held in 

Bartko v. SEC that it was “impermissibly retroactive” for the Commission to impose a collateral 

bar based on conduct that pre-dated July 21, 2010, the effective date of the Dodd-Frank Wall 

Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act.5 As a result of that decision, the Commission 

announced a program allowing persons subject to collateral bars to request that the Commission 

exercise its discretion to vacate certain of those bars.6 

On July 18, 2019, Uppal filed a request to vacate the collateral bars entered against him. 

Because the OIP and the Initial Decision contained allegations of misconduct supporting the bars 

that extended beyond July 21, 2010, we requested briefing from both parties on the question of 

whether relevant misconduct continued past July 21, 2010, and, if it did, whether the bars should 

be vacated notwithstanding such post Dodd-Frank misconduct.

7

In response to our request for additional briefing, the Division opposed Uppal’s request to 

vacate the collateral bars entered against him, arguing that Uppal “engaged in unlawful conduct 

from at least July 2007 until September 2013, over three years after the Dodd-Frank Act’s 

effective date.” The Division further noted that the Initial Decision included an analysis of all of 

the requisite factors in determining that, based on Uppal’s conduct (including that which postdated the effective date of the Dodd-Frank Act), a bar of Uppal in each of the capacities specified 

above was in the public interest.8 Uppal did not respond to the request for additional briefing.

Based on the Division’s submission and our review of the relevant misconduct, we find it 

appropriate to deny Uppal’s request. As the Initial Decision describes, Uppal’s misconduct 

occurred “over at least a six-year period,” more than half of which fell after the effective date of 

the Dodd-Frank Act. Further, exhibits the Division submitted in support of its motion for 

summary disposition detail numerous instances of Uppal’s misconduct that occurred after July 

21, 2010.9 Although some of Uppal’s misconduct occurred before the effective date of the 

3

Sachin K. Uppal, Initial Decision Release No. 920, 2015 WL 7748187, at *8 (Dec. 1, 

2015).

4

Sachin K. Uppal, Advisers Act Release No. 4330, 2016 WL 9990697 (Feb. 5, 2016) 

(declaring the Initial Decision final after Uppal failed to file a petition for review and the 

Commission’s not choosing to review the decision on its own initiative).

5

845 F.3d 1217, 1225 (D.C. Cir. 2017). 

6

https://www.sec.gov/news/statement/commission-statement-regarding-bartko-v-sec. 

7

Sachin K. Uppal, Advisers Act Release No. 6364, 2023 WL 4998127 (Aug. 4, 2023).

8

Steadman v. SEC, 603 F.2d 1126, 1140 (5th Cir. 1979), aff’d on other grounds, 450 U.S. 

91 (1981).

9 The Division attached to its motion for summary disposition nine exhibits from the

underlying criminal proceeding against Uppal, including the criminal information, plea 

agreement, the government’s sentencing memorandum, the district court’s judgment, and the 

(continued...)
3

Dodd-Frank Act, the misconduct that post-dated the effective date of the Dodd-Frank Act was 

thus significant and, by itself, warrants a bar from associating in all of the capacities listed 

above.10 

Accordingly, it is ORDERED that Sachin K. Uppal’s request to vacate collateral bars is 

DENIED.

By the Commission.

Vanessa A. Countryman

Secretary

transcript of Uppal’s sentencing hearing. United States v. Sachin Uppal, No. 14-cr-20354 

(E.D.Mich. 2014). Victim statements attached to the government’s sentencing memorandum, 

which were referenced in the Initial Decision, discuss misconduct by Uppal that occurred in 

2011, involving three separate clients and resulting in the loss of several hundred thousand 

dollars by those clients. The transcript of Uppal’s sentencing hearing includes testimony, 

referenced in the Initial Decision, by a victim who stated that he had asked Uppal for money to 

pay for his daughter’s wedding in 2012, and that Uppal had provided him with two checks for 

$150,000 that “both bounced.” The same witness testified that he again asked Uppal for money 

in 2013, but that Uppal “played with [his] emotions for two years” and “took all the money,” 

totaling approximately $1.5 million. 

10 See, e.g., Joseph A. Meyer, Jr., Exchange Act Release No. 94822, 2022 WL 1288226, at 

*4 n.17 (Apr. 29, 2022) (noting that respondent’s misconduct “spanned from August 2009 

through at least 2018” and finding that the conduct that post-dated the effective date of the DoddFrank Act demonstrated that a bar was necessary to protect the public (citation omitted)).