http://securities.law360.com/ The Newswire for Legal Professionals Copyright 2009 Portfolio Media, Inc. en-US http://securities.law360.com/images/headings/logo.gif http://securities.law360.com/ http://securities.law360.com/articles/135439 The federal judge overseeing a securities class action against Vivendi SA has rejected the plaintiffs’ bid to force the French entertainment giant to withdraw a suit it filed in Paris seeking to bar two class representatives from participating in the U.S. case, instead taking steps to obviate any need for the courts to infringe on each other’s jurisdictions. http://securities.law360.com/articles/135439 http://securities.law360.com/articles/135512 OppenheimerFunds Inc. has said it will pay $20 million to settle a lawsuit by the state of Oregon, which claimed that the fund’s supposedly conservative 529 program actually made aggressive, risky investments that lost parents money they had been saving to pay for college for their children. http://securities.law360.com/articles/135512 http://securities.law360.com/articles/135382 After letting Bernard Madoff's massive $50 billion Ponzi scheme slip by largely unnoticed, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission’s Office of the Inspector General has issued a report that takes a long, hard look at the process currently used to single out investment advisers for investigation and suggests how to repair the fraud detection methods that failed Madoff investors. http://securities.law360.com/articles/135382 http://securities.law360.com/articles/135379 Retalix Ltd. has quickly snuffed a putative shareholder class action accusing the software company and its directors of agreeing to a lopsided $32.9 million share purchase agreement with a group of investors. http://securities.law360.com/articles/135379 http://securities.law360.com/articles/135414 The special receiver for defunct AmeriFirst Funding Inc. is taking a third crack at a negligence suit against the law firm Godwin Ronquillo PC and one of its former partners over their securities law advice. http://securities.law360.com/articles/135414 http://securities.law360.com/articles/135429 After more than three years of litigation and failed mediation efforts, Quest Software Inc. has agreed to pay a class of investors $29.4 million to settle allegations that the company’s stock options backdating artificially inflated stock prices. http://securities.law360.com/articles/135429 http://securities.law360.com/articles/135354 A jury has convicted the ex-chairman of McKesson Corp. on several counts of securities fraud handed down in the wake of a $9 billion accounting scandal at the health care firm but has let the firm's former general counsel off the hook. http://securities.law360.com/articles/135354 http://securities.law360.com/articles/135356 A foreign currency trader who swindled investors across the country to fund his lifestyle and buy gifts for girlfriends has been sentenced to more than 24 years in prison and ordered to pay $18 million in restitution. http://securities.law360.com/articles/135356 http://securities.law360.com/articles/135291 The Delaware Supreme Court has affirmed a $10 million default judgment for Italiana Coke SpA and Energy Coal SpA, which had enforced a settlement deal that ended the coal companies' fraud litigation against two energy investors. http://securities.law360.com/articles/135291 http://securities.law360.com/articles/135193 A federal judge has appointed a receiver to handle the remaining assets of bankrupt oil and gas securities firm Heartland Resources Inc. following a magistrate's finding that, without a receiver, plaintiffs alleging a $14 million fraud would suffer irreparable injury. http://securities.law360.com/articles/135193 http://securities.law360.com/articles/135261 A Florida tycoon has hurled a raft of corruption allegations at the judge presiding over the receivership of Rothstein Rosenfeldt & Adler PA, the firm facing bankruptcy amid a Ponzi scheme scandal. http://securities.law360.com/articles/135261 http://securities.law360.com/articles/135186 The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission has accused a former executive of semiconductor company Tvia Inc. of making side deals with customers that caused the company to overreport revenues by $5 million and allowed him to pocket $300,000 after he cashed in stock options he had won for hitting revenue targets. http://securities.law360.com/articles/135186 http://securities.law360.com/articles/135288 Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu and Grant Thornton International have agreed to cough up $15 million to settle with a class of Parmalat SpA stockholders in a suit stemming from the Italian dairy giant's collapse. http://securities.law360.com/articles/135288 http://securities.law360.com/articles/135184 Merrill Lynch Pierce Fenner & Smith Inc. has asked a judge to dismiss a complaint in the multidistrict litigation over auction rate securities, arguing that Community Trust Bank Inc.'s allegation that Merrill Lynch surreptitiously manipulated the ARS market doesn't hold water. http://securities.law360.com/articles/135184 http://securities.law360.com/articles/135263 British leaders have proposed a bill that would bolster the power of the country's Financial Services Authority – as well as the general public – to hold banks accountable for irresponsible business practices. http://securities.law360.com/articles/135263 http://securities.law360.com/articles/135158 U.S. Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner appeared before a bicameral congressional panel Thursday to underscore the urgency of completing financial regulatory reform, taking heat from several Republican lawmakers calling for his resignation in the wake of alleged bailout missteps. http://securities.law360.com/articles/135158 http://securities.law360.com/articles/135163 Victims of Robert Allen Stanford’s alleged $7 billion Ponzi scheme have launched a putative class action accusing Bank of New York Mellon Corp. subsidiary Pershing LLC of aiding the massive fraud. http://securities.law360.com/articles/135163 http://securities.law360.com/articles/135228 Clarification is imminent on a contested $50 million Lloyd's of London insurance policy issued to alleged Ponzi artist R. Allen Stanford and other executives at his Stanford International Bank and related entities, as the insurer has sued for declaratory relief in an effort to avoid funding the accused fraudsters' criminal defense. http://securities.law360.com/articles/135228 http://securities.law360.com/articles/135173 Ordered to arbitrate its dispute with Citigroup Inc.’s brokerage division over the sale of $41 million of worthless auction rate securities, Braintree Laboratories Inc. is trying to avoid holding the proceeding before a Financial Industry Regulatory Authority panel that the plaintiff says favors the accused. http://securities.law360.com/articles/135173 http://securities.law360.com/articles/135084 The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission sued Big Apple Consulting USA Inc. and its executives Wednesday for making fraudulent misrepresentations about hundreds of millions of shares of stock it sold in CyberKey Solutions Inc., whose chairman and CEO is in prison on related criminal charges. http://securities.law360.com/articles/135084