vania-janet/multiturn-rag-retrieval-data huggingface dataset:
If this goes through and the company is punished sufficiently this breach with ultimately be good news.  Security as been too easily neglected because fixing it provides no obvious immediate benefit to the customer as opposed to other features.  So the only way this gets addressed is when CEO's and stockholders feel significant pain.
"The primary reason a scandal like this hurts the company is the ""bottom line.""  Any legal action means defense costs.  In this case the potential of massive fines became reality.  And a buyback program.   So, if any publicly traded company stacked up $10B in assets, doused it in diesel and set it on fire, their stock would take a dip too. Billions in revenue directed to the expense side of the ledger instead of the profit side.  That money should have gone to building the company and dividends."
Insider trading is any trading done on material non-public information relating to an instrument.  If my sister, who works for a drugs testing company, tells me that stage 3 trials of a drug look like they will fail and I trade on that information (probably by shorting a company's stock) that is insider trading. If an employee of that firm trades on that same stock knowing that the trials are likely to fail that is too. If an employee of that company trades on the stock without knowing that information that is NOT insider trading. If I know from an insider I met at the pub that a large orange producer has seen a fall in production due to a blight and I trade on oranges futures, even though I am not directly trading in the stock it is still insider trading. I mentioned that the information must be material, that means that it must have the potential to move the market; if I know that a firm is going to increase profits by 10% this year it is not material if analyst expectations are for a similar rise. You are right that small scale insider trading, such as by employees and their families, is relatively unregulated and unchecked but directors and C-level employees of a firm are required to publish all and any dealings that they have in the stock and several have been caught and penalized for insider trading. edit: http://www.sec.gov/spotlight/insidertrading/cases.shtml details some cases, many involving director and C-level employees, that the SEC has prosecuted recently. Incidentally I work in financial fraud monitoring and we use an analytic based on previous days' trades and today's news (i.e. when the information becomes public) to identify traders who might either be indulging in or receiving orders to trade on insider information. Essentially this works by looking for large changes in position against an instrument that later has material information releases relevant to it. One final thing to think about: given that being caught will generally cause perpetrators to go to prison and be banned from director level jobs and/or trading for life as well as a large, life-changing fine and a massive loss of reputation not many people with insider information want to risk trading on it, myself included.
"No.  And furthermore, canceling based on insider information is not considered insider trading. SEC Interpretation from October of 2000: (a) Does the act of terminating a plan while aware of material nonpublic information result in liability under Section 10(b) and Rule 10b-5? No. Section 10(b) and Rule 10b-5 apply ""in connection with the purchase or sale of any security."" Thus, a purchase or sale of a security must be present for liability to attach. See Blue Chip Stamps v. Manor Drug Stores, 421 U.S. 723 (1975). [link mine] A 10b5-2 is a rule in the SEC's section in federal law that governs trading on ""material nonpublic information."" Fried (2002) even concluded that: The SEC's safe harbour permitting insiders to buy or sell shares pursuant to prearranged trading plans while in possession of material nonpublic information and to cancel the plans while aware of material nonpublic information enables insiders to profit from their access to such information.  The SEC could easily eliminate insider's advantages over public shareholders by not allowing insiders to cancel their plans after becoming aware of material nonpublic information."
"Wrongful termination my ass.  There are four protected categories those being Age, Sex, Color and Creed.  Anything else?  Fair game.    ""Hey, Bahhumbugger, Never say stupid when you mean you disagree. Seriously.  Here's a memo to that effect.""   Two days later, Bahhumbugger: fired for cause, for incorrectly using the word ""Stupid.""  Holds up fine in court.  I know, I've done it."
I am still waiting for the investor lawsuit against Lampert for breaching his fiduicary duty by prioritizing his hedge fund over Sears. He is looting Sears piecemeal and assigning the assets to the hedge fund. How is this anything but a breach of his legal duty? I would not be surprised if this is approaching illegal levels of looting, and not just civil damages.
There are penalties for failure to file and penalties for failure to pay tax. The penalties for both are based on the amount of tax due. So you would owe % penalties of zero, otherwise meaning no penalties at all. The IRS on late 1040 penalties: Here are eight important points about penalties for filing or paying late. A failure-to-file penalty may apply if you did not file by the tax filing deadline. A failure-to-pay penalty may apply if you did not pay all of the taxes you owe by the tax filing deadline. The failure-to-file penalty is generally more than the failure-to-pay penalty. You should file your tax return on time each year, even if you’re not able to pay all the taxes you owe by the due date. You can reduce additional interest and penalties by paying as much as you can with your tax return. You should explore other payment options such as getting a loan or making an installment agreement to make payments. The IRS will work with you. The penalty for filing late is normally 5 percent of the unpaid taxes for each month or part of a month that a tax return is late. That penalty starts accruing the day after the tax filing due date and will not exceed 25 percent of your unpaid taxes. If you do not pay your taxes by the tax deadline, you normally will face a failure-to-pay penalty of ½ of 1 percent of your unpaid taxes. That penalty applies for each month or part of a month after the due date and starts accruing the day after the tax-filing due date. If you timely requested an extension of time to file your individual income tax return and paid at least 90 percent of the taxes you owe with your request, you may not face a failure-to-pay penalty. However, you must pay any remaining balance by the extended due date. If both the 5 percent failure-to-file penalty and the ½ percent failure-to-pay penalties apply in any month, the maximum penalty that you’ll pay for both is 5 percent. If you file your return more than 60 days after the due date or extended due date, the minimum penalty is the smaller of $135 or 100 percent of the unpaid tax.
Generally, the answer is as follows:  If there is a legal obligation to pay cash flow (including the possibility of court determined restructuring), then it is debt.  If the asset owner is not guaranteed any cash flow,  but instead owns the *residual* cash flow from the operations of the business (I.e. the cash flow left-over), then it is equity.
"[This is the simple solution.](http://market-ticker.org/akcs-www?singlepost=3041628)  ""Since the Securities and Exchange Act requires that all orders must be intended to execute there's a simple way to prevent this sort of nanosecond game, where any part of the strategy involves ""flashing"" an order that isn't really intended to execute and thus clear through the exchange: Force all orders to be valid for two full seconds or until executed."""
It's a ludicrously slanted article. Arbitration is not a bad thing. It's usually less expensive for both parties and is a much quicker process than litigating. The same laws apply except it's harder for the defendant to win on a technicality. Are there drawbacks? Sure. But this is not a big scandal. Class action lawsuits have issues their own.
"Here is one ""other consideration"": don't, don't, don't sell based on insider information. Insider trading can land you in jail. And it's not restricted to top executives. Even overhearing a discussion about the current status of the acquisition talks can mean that you have insider information that you legally cannot act on in many jurisdictions. If you are just a regular employee, the SEC will likely not subject your dealings to special scrutiny, especially since lots of your colleagues will likely trade your company's shares at this point in time. And if you definitely hold insider info (for example, if you are intimately involved with the acquisition talks), you will likely have had a very serious warning about insider trading and know what you can and what you cannot do. Nevertheless, it's better to be careful here."
This isn't a joke. Tons of people in sales and trading used it.  Fuck Bloomberg chat. The joke for bchat was the bell.   This is how Goldman got in trouble for calling people muppets. I nearly shit myself when that came out because I knew compliance would be looking through chats for the word and my group of friends called each muppets all the time.  Weird convos with compliance happened shortly after when you had to have your buddy write an email to compliance saying it wasn't insulting to them.
As consumers, we need to demand licenses for content which state that they cannot be revoked unless there is a demonstrated violation of the terms of service. Those violations should have to be specifically enumerated and provided in writing to the licensee.
"It becomes illegal when it is both material and nonpublic information. Material being defined as: Information that you would want and significantly alters the perception of the stock. To your point -- ""materiality"" is really up to the courts Nonpublic This is a little easier to define, but need to be careful if the information is disclosed selectively -- ie to just a small number of investment analysts -- this may still be nonpublic There is also an exception to this -- Mosaic Theory - This is the research you are referring to where the analyst calls up suppliers, etc and obtains information that is nonmaterial (wouldn't move the price of the security) but using experience and combined with public information creates something that is meaningful and could move the price of the security.  This is perfectly legal.  Material examples:"
You win, you are more pedantic than me. I give up.   Edit: okay, I think I can be more pedantic than you here actually.  Corporations don't even have to follow the law as long as their revenue from breaking the law is greater than the consequences of breaking said law.   Ethics come from proper regulation.
"I'm answering my own question because in some sense, I alone know the answer. After the review, HMRC decided to waive all penalties (including the initial £100 penalty for late filing, which I had not appealed against) because ""HMRC may not have informed me"" about the mounting penalties. I had pretty good evidence that they hadn't informed me as there was a software change and immediately after that I got an initial penalty notice followed a day or so later by the further penalty notice.  But I am happy with the outcome, I wasn't going to argue any further!"
We don't really know the official reason for his dismissal, and might not until it goes to court.  It was probably a mistake to post a 'manifesto' to a company-wide message board. Message boards in general are a bad idea, but especially internally to a business, I'm not sure what Google was thinking when they came up with that. It certainly gives employees the ability to express hostility in a broad manner.
"I was going to argue about the ""intent to execute"" but when I read Denninger's argument carefully, I was forced to agree. To the extent that the SEC rules are requiring human intention (should they?) then yes a time limit like 2 seconds (or even longer) can make sense. It's a kludgy solution though."
"Shariah compliant investments attempt to achieve your ""ethical investing"" ideals. Many countries around the world have a long list of shariah compliant investments and lots of journalists will go great lengths to reveal when a company is not really shariah compliant. Standard & Poors (S&P), an American financial services company, hosts a Shariah compliant index too, but on the Toronto Stock Exchange in Canada due to the Islamaphobia rampant in the United States. But of course, international companies are indifferent to any single country's social problems, and in your new pastime as an international speculator you will get the same luxury too and exemption from the political spectrum. S&P/TSX 60 information can be found here: http://web.tmxmoney.com/tmx_indices.php?section=tsx&index=%5ETXSI Business sectors prohibited from the Shariah index include: Gambling, Pornography, Tobacco, amongst others. In the United States, the concept has been renamed ""B-Corporation"" (a play on the federal term C-Corporation and S-Corporation), and has garnered enough of a movement that several states have created these as entities people can actually register them with the state, but these are not recognized as ""B-Corporations"" to the federal government. Shariah compliant investments will be easier to find worldwide, due to the popularity of the associated religion."
"Sure, Yahoo Finance makes mistakes from time to time.  That's the nature of free data. However, I think the issue here is that yahoo is aggregating several line items into one.  Like maybe reporting cash equivalents plus total investment securities minus loans as ""cash equivalents.""  This aggregation is done by a computer program somewhere and may or may not be appropriate for a particular purpose and firm. For this reason, if you are trying to do top quality research, it's always better to go to the original SEC filings, if you can.  Then you will know for sure which items you are looking at.  The only mistakes will be the ones made by the accountants at the firm in question. If there's a reason you prefer to use yahoo, like if it's easier for your code to scrape, then spend a little time comparing to the SEC filing to ensure you know where the numbers really come from before using it."
ACPs do not use the simple 2% threshold, and include other provisions which can allow the plan to ""shift"" excess passing rates from the ADP over to the ACP. A failed ACP test is likewise addressed through return of excess, or a QNEC or qualified match (QMAC). There are a number of ""safe harbor"" provisions that can allow a company to be exempted from the ADP test. This includes making a ""safe harbor"" employer contribution to employees' accounts. Safe harbor contributions can take the form of a match (generally totaling 4% of pay) or a non-elective profit sharing (totaling 3% of pay). Safe harbor 401(k) contributions must be 100% vested at all times with immediate eligibility for employees. There are other administrative requirements within the safe harbor, such as requiring the employer to notify all eligible employees of the opportunity to participate in the plan, and restricting the employer from suspending participants for any reason other than due to a hardship withdrawal."
“These actions show there is a financial cost for violating FTC orders.” In the case referenced above, the owners of a 20+ dealership chain was hit with about $250,000 in fines. If you think that's a tiny portion of the unethical gains they made from those ads in the time they were running, I'd say you were absolutely correct and that's little more than a ""cost of doing business"" for unscrupulous companies. But that's the state of the US nation at this time, and so we are left with ""caveat emptor"" as a guiding principle. What can you do about it? Competitors are technically allowed to file suit for deceptive business practices, so if you know any honest dealers in the area you can tip them off about it (try saying that out loud with a serious face). But even better, you can contact the FTC and file a formal complaint online. I wouldn't expect the world to change for your complaint, but even if it just generates a letter it may be enough to let a company know someone is watching - and if they are a big business, they might actually get into a little bit of trouble."
I haven't really dug into this story.  Did he release a public memo, or did he write an internal memo that someone else released?  To me, that's a big difference.  Anyone should be allowed to voice their concerns and get a fair hearing, and an organization that fires anyone who questions their policies is toxic.  The way some stories are written, it sounds as though the VP of Diversity had his head because he dared to question the way she does her job.   That's quite a bit different than airing your grievances publicly, though.  Frankly, if one of my employees had a viral rant about my company, I'd probably show him the door.  It's not about his opinions at that point, it's about the lack of discretion.
Thats not quite as bad. The execs would get charged individually for dumping the stocks. In Anderson's case, the company itself was facing criminal charges. The worst case for Anderson was a corporate death penalty, being unable to submit financial documents to the SEC. Worst case for Equifax is that they pay out a large settlement and some execs get fired. Its not going to kill the company though.   It seems like a very different situation to me. But hey, I bought a few shares when it dropped to 92 bucks, so maybe I am biased.
You're getting confused between several different things. 10K - cash transactions over $10,000 are reported to FinCEN under BSA. This is to prevent money laundering. IRS - IRS wants to see your tax return with all your income reported there. They don't see your bank deposits unless they audit you. 1 and 2 are not related at all.
Yes and no.  Courts do understand the idea of tyranny of the majority.  Specifically, actions that hurt the company for personal gain is still theft against the minority shareholders.  It's common misconception that this fiduciary duty means that a CEO's job is to raise the price of their stock.  The truth is, stock price is a number that has an extremely tenuous relation to actual company health.  So, it's entirely possible for a shareholder lawsuit to happen.  It's just typically cheaper and less hassle to sell the stocks for a loss and get out while they can.
My question is: absent the corporate shield, to what extent are partners liable for a serious disaster or accident such as the BP Gulf incident. IN other words, if an oil pipeline had a major spill or explosion in which there were serious liabilities, to what extent would this effect the owners of a listed partnership beyond the effects of corporate liability on a common stock holding?
The terms of the offer are a contract, so they are applicable in determining whether it's fraud or not.  That said, your situation is not fraud, because fraud requires intentionality. Only the case where someone knew they were violating the terms of the offer (as with the story here) is fraud.
I believe the appropriate recourse in this scenario is to bring a court case for breach of contract.   The 1p repricing issue has been admitted as an error out of scope of the purpose of the software.
It's about how volatile the instrument is. Brokers are concerned not about you but about potential lawsuits stemming from their perceived inadequate risk management - letting you trade extremely volatile stocks with high leverage.  On top of that they run the risk of losing money in scenarios where a trader shorts a stock with all of the funds, the company rises 100% or more by the next day, in which case the trader owes money to the broker. If you look in detail you'll see that many of the companies with high margin requirements are extremely volatile pharmaceutical companies which depend heavily of FDA approvals.
So the MS analyst wasn't acting independently of MS's role as underwriter when he revised his earnings estimates?   MS is a big place.  I guess I just assumed that someone could be on one end saying something, with other parts of the company blissfully unaware.  All without a conspiracy to commit fraud.  Good to know.   Perhaps you can point - for those of us ignorant in finance - to the rules or laws that were broken here.
What a lot of people do not know about the SEC is they do a piss poor job of collecting. They are a creditor in a civil case and do not have the same powers as say the IRS. They usually win cases because it is easier to settle with a Federal Lawyer who is taking you Federal Court and proving innocence in a civil trial is hard where as proving guilt in a Federal Criminal case is easier.   They get settlement, get PR, move on.
When businesses use arbitration-only clauses, they essentially force any enforcement action for wrong doing onto government. No matter how egregious are the actions of the business, it is not financially feasible to arbitrate for small dollar issues and it is thus up to government to litigate.  This allows businesses to act with impunity as they know that the risks of government action are slim and there is no chance of getting sued by private parties.    Remember all of those unauthorized bank accounts that Wells Fargo opened?  When sued by private parties, they successfully argued that it must go to arbitration. The bank committed fraud against their customers and they still get to pick the venue and terms of any litigation.
There is certainly an obligation in some cases of a company to distribute profit, either as dividend or a stock buy back. Activist investors frequently push for one or the other when a company is doing well - sometimes to the detriment of future growth, in some eyes - and can even file shareholder lawsuits (saying the company is not doing its duty to its shareholders by simply holding onto cash).  Apple famously held out from doing either for years under Steve Jobs, and only in the last few years started doing both - a large dividend and a share buy-back which increases the value of remaining shares (as EPS then goes up with fewer shares out there).  Carl Icahn for example is one of those investors in Apple's case [and in many cases!] who put significant pressure, particularly when they were sitting on hundreds of billions of dollars. Ultimately, a (for-profit) corporation's board is tasked with maximizing its shareholder's wealth; as such, it can buy back shares, pay dividends, sell the company, liquidate the company, or expand the company, at its discretion, so long as it can justify to its shareholders that it is still attempting to maximize the value of their holdings.  Companies in their growth phase often don't return any money and simply reinvest - but the long-term hope is to either return money in the form of dividends on profits, or the sale of the company.
Martha Stewart went to jail for conspiracy, obstruction of an agency proceeding, and making false statements to federal investigators. The judge threw out the securities fraud charge.  She wasn't punished for insider trading. She only served 5 months because she tried to cover it up.