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The Securities and Exchange Commission voted 3-to-2 yesterday to seek public comment on the Volcker revamp, the last of five agencies that needed to sign off on the proposal, Bloomberg News reported. After reviewing feedback from financial firms, lawmakers and Wall Street critics, regulators will likely hold a second round of votes on whether to make the changes final. The plan for revising Volcker, which was named for former Federal Reserve Chairman Paul Volcker, is a significant win for banks that have long argued the original rule was overly complex and costly to comply with. The Federal Reserve became the first agency to move the proposal forward last week, followed by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp., the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, the Commodity Futures Trading Commission and now the SEC. The proposal maintains Volcker’s ban on proprietary trading, in which banks invest for their own profits rather than on behalf of customers. But it would remove an important assumption that positions held by lenders for fewer than 60 days are proprietary and make it easier for banks to determine whether trades are prohibited. Regulators also want to give firms more leeway to take advantage of exemptions in Volcker that permit trades that hedge market risk and are done for market-making purposes.

Fighting fraud in virtual currencies has almost become a game of Whac-A-Mole for regulators and federal prosecutors, who find each new iteration seemingly a few steps ahead them, according to a New York Times commentary. The challenge the authorities face is that cryptocurrencies are so new that they do not fit neatly into laws that were passed decades ago prohibiting misconduct in the securities and commodities markets. It will take time for those regulations to catch up, according to the commentary. Unlike fraudulent schemes or theft from individual investors, this type of conduct cuts to the heart of the market for virtual currencies. It means that prices may not reflect any true value but instead are being driven up or down artificially by those seeking to profit, according to the commentary. The SEC’s jurisdiction only covers investments used to help fund companies, and Bitcoin hardly fits that model. Instead, the agency has focused on companies using initial coin offerings to raise money, arguing that doing so is the same as selling stocks or bonds to investors, and therefore the complex securities registration rules must be followed.

The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission said yesterday that it had won an emergency court order halting an alleged fraud involving an initial coin offering that raised as much as $21 million from investors in the U.S. and elsewhere, Reuters reported. The court also approved an emergency asset freeze and the appointment of a receiver for Titanium Blockchain Infrastructure Services Inc, the firm behind the alleged scheme, the SEC said in a statement.

The Securities and Exchange Commission set up HoweyCoins.com, a fake site to mimic other too-good-to-be-true coin offerings that have surged during the rise of bitcoin and other digital currencies, in order to help investors recognize investment scams, CNBC.com reported. The site details how investors can get in on the offer, which purportedly combines blockchain technology and travel. It even says HoweyCoins are registered with the U.S. government and will trade on an SEC-compliant exchange. The site also includes aspects that regulators view as common enticements to fraudulent offerings, such as a complex white paper, promises of guaranteed returns and a countdown clock showing how long you have left to get in on the deal.

Kraken, the digital-currency exchange that recently refused to respond to inquiries from New York’s top lawyer, seems to be warming up to regulators, Bloomberg News reported. The San Francisco-based company, founded in 2011 in the wake of Mt. Gox’s collapse, will probably register with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission as regulators continue cracking down on cryptocurrencies, Chief Executive Officer Jesse Powell said. “We would probably get registered as a broker dealer and then an ATS,’’ Powell said yesterday. “I don’t think it necessarily helps the business. I think we’re doing everything right anyway." An ATS, or alternative trading system, is a trading venue that operates outside traditional public stock exchanges. Any new U.S.-based ATS must be approved by Wall Street’s top watchdog, the SEC, and is subject to its authority. Being labeled an ATS would bring Kraken more directly under the SEC’s oversight. The agency has been encouraging firms in the crypto arena to pursue ATS applications.

Cenveo Inc.’s reorganization plan, which looks to protect company insiders from future litigation, is facing obstacles from the Securities and Exchange Commission, WSJ Pro Bankruptcy reported. The regulator is objecting to Cenveo’s so-called disclosure statement and reorganization plan because it provides releases to company insiders (including management), lenders and bondholders. Such releases would shield them from being sued in the future. “As written, the plan would bar the SEC from enforcing its full police and regulatory powers against the released parties,” the agency wrote in court papers filed on Wednesday. The SEC, in court papers, noted that an examiner was put in place in March to oversee the bankruptcy proceedings. Susheel Kirplani was appointed by the U.S. Trustee in late March after a key creditor called for the appointment in order to investigate potential insider transactions that could benefit the family behind Cenveo.

The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) on Wednesday launched a searchable database of individuals who have been targeted by the federal watchdog for allegedly breaking trading laws, The Hill reported. The database, called the SEC Action Lookup for Individuals (SALI), allows investors to check whether the person offering them an investment has been penalized for violating securities laws. The tool is intended to help investors avoid bad actors likely to defraud them, SEC Chairman Jay Clayton said in a statement. "One of the SEC’s most important tasks is to arm our investors with the tools necessary to identify potential fraudsters. An important risk factor is whether the person you are dealing with has a disciplinary history with the SEC or other regulators,” Clayton said. The SEC said that the database will include individuals “who have settled, defaulted, or contested an enforcement action brought by the SEC, provided that a final judgment or order was entered against them in a federal court or an administrative proceeding.”

The U.S. Supreme Court considered bolstering the president’s power over federal agencies in a clash over the constitutional status of the in-house judges who handle complaints at the Securities and Exchange Commission, Bloomberg News reported. The justices yesterday heard an appeal from Raymond Lucia, who was fined $300,000 and barred from working as an investment adviser after an SEC judge found he misled prospective clients with his "Buckets of Money" retirement plan. Lucia, with the support of the Trump administration, contends the administrative law judge who handled his case was appointed in violation of the Constitution. A victory for Lucia could open those judges, and others across the federal government, to being fired for issuing rulings that clash with administration priorities. Chief Justice John Roberts cast the dispute as one that could bring "political accountability" to judges who operate within the federal bureaucracy. But Justice Stephen Breyer said it could mean "goodbye to the independence" of agency judges.