David L. Axelrod

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axelrodd@ballardspahr.com | 215.864.8639 | view full bio

David is a former Supervisory Trial Counsel at the SEC’s Philadelphia Regional Office and a former federal prosecutor. His practice focuses on representing companies and individuals under investigation by government agencies, including the DOJ and SEC, concerning alleged violations of state and federal law, including securities laws and the FCPA, as well as antitrust matters. David also helps FinTech companies, including cryptocurrency (i.e., Bitcoin) issuers, navigate a wide range of regulatory issues and obstacles.

As a federal prosecutor, David prosecuted investigated and prosecuted a number of cases involving money laundering and violations of the BSA.

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Government Alleges that Broker Dealer Ignored Major Red Flags Raised by Pay Day Lending Scheme

For the first time, a broker-dealer, Central States Capital Markets, LLC (Central States), has been prosecuted for violating the Bank Secrecy Act (BSA). Central States stipulated to the accuracy of a deferred prosecution agreement‘s (DPA) Statement of Facts, which detailed significant failures to comply with its customer identification procedures (CIP), failures to investigate and file Suspicious Activity Reports (SARs), and failures to monitor red flag transactions.

The government’s prosecution of Central States is not surprising given its recent heightened interest in ensuring that financial gatekeepers like broker-dealers are complying with the AML/BSA laws. Indeed, the allegations show that Central States failed to take basic steps to comply with their AML/BSA obligations despite having procedures and processes in place.
Continue Reading  SDNY Unveils First Criminal Prosecution of Broker-Dealer for Violating BSA

As we previously have blogged, the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (“FinCEN”) became one of the first regulators to wade into the regulation of cryptocurrency when it released interpretive guidance in March 2013 stating that an administrator or exchanger of virtual currency is a Money Services Business (“MSB”). As a MSB, and according to FinCEN, an administrator or exchanger of virtual currency therefore is a “financial institution” subject to the Bank Secrecy Act (“BSA”) and its various AML-related requirements, unless a limitation or exemption applies.  Accordingly, the Department of Justice has prosecuted operators of cryptocurrency exchanges for a failure to register with FinCEN as a MSB, and FinCEN has brought civil enforcement proceedings against such exchanges for alleged failures to maintain adequate AML programs and file required Suspicious Activity Reports (“SARS”), among other alleged BSA violations.

Recently, regulators of all stripes across the globe have been moving swiftly to regulate cryptocurrency in various ways (see here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, and here). Indeed, the Securities and Exchange Commission (“SEC”) has been very vocal and aggressive in claiming that many if not all Initial Coin Offerings (“ICOs”) involving cryptocurrency represent securities subject to the jurisdiction and supervision of the SEC, and already has filed several enforcement proceedings involving ICOs. Moreover the SEC just yesterday issued a statement that it considers exchanges for cryptocurrency to also be subject to its jurisdiction. Likewise, the U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission (“CFTC”) has asserted that cryptocurrencies are commodities subject to its jurisdiction; this week, a federal court agreed with this assertion in a CFTC enforcement action.  The CFTC claims that its jurisdiction reaches beyond cryptocurrency derivative products to fraud and manipulation in the underlying cryptocurrency spot markets.

But there is a potential problem with all of these regulators simultaneously rushing in to assert their respective power over cryptocurrency businesses, and it is a tension that does not seem to have attracted much public attention to date. Specifically, BSA regulations pertaining to the definition of a MSB, at 31 C.F.R. § 1010.100(ff)(8)(ii), flatly state that a MSB does not include the following:

A person registered with, and functionally regulated or examined by, the SEC or the CFTC, or a foreign financial agency that engages in financial activities that, if conducted in the United States, would require the foreign financial agency to be registered with the SEC or CFTC[.]

How can certain cryptocurrency businesses be subject to the claimed jurisdictions of FinCEN as well as the recent regulatory newcomers to this area, the SEC and the CFTC?
Continue Reading  FinCEN Letter to U.S. Senate Committee on Finance Purports to Thread Needle of Potentially Competing Jurisdictions by Regulators over Cryptocurrencies

Yesterday, the SEC Office of Compliance Inspections and Examinations (OCIE) announced its 2018 examination priorities, released in order to “improve compliance, prevent fraud, monitor risk, and inform policy.”  OCIE announced five priorities, with Anti-Money Laundering (“AML”) programs being one of them.  This emphasis on AML is consistent with the SEC’s increasing willingness to bring enforcement actions relating to AML and the Bank Secrecy Act (“BSA”).  As we also discuss, here and in our sister blog, CyberAdviser, another priority announced by OCIE is cybersecurity, an issue which increasingly overlaps with AML issues.
Continue Reading  SEC Targets AML as Exam Priority

We are very pleased to be presenting on the topic of SEC enforcement against broker-dealers and mutual funds relating to alleged underlying Anti-Money Laundering and Bank Secrecy Act violations, and associated private class action lawsuits, at the upcoming meeting of the Securities Regulation Committee of the New York State Bar Association on this Wednesday, December…

On June 5th, the United States Supreme Court held in Honeycutt v. United States that a criminal defendant is not jointly and severally liable for property his co-conspirator derived from the crime, and that he only can be ordered to forfeit property he actually obtained from the crime.  Although the decision was unanimous (with Justice Gorsuch abstaining), the outcome was far from preordained.

Until 2015, courts applying the forfeiture statute, 21 U.S.C. § 853, had uniformly held that co-conspirators are jointly and severally liable for amounts received pursuant to the conspiracy.  That rule was adopted by nine circuits.  However, in 2015, the D.C. Circuit split with its sister circuits in United States v. Cano Flores, rejecting joint and several liability for co-conspirators.    The district court in Honeycutt sided with the D.C. Circuit, but the Sixth Circuit reversed, following the overwhelming majority view of the other Courts of Appeal.

The result in Honeycutt, and the underlying analysis and related policy arguments, may have implications in other government enforcement contexts, including in securities cases. Further, the result appears to obligate the government to perform some degree of a tracing analysis to tie individual defendants to specific tainted funds – an analysis which might be difficult in complex fact patterns involving multiple defendants and the use of multiple entities or financial accounts.
Continue Reading  A Criminal Defendant Cannot Forfeit Property He Never Received