In Regulatory Wrap for the week to September 6, Jennie Clarke discusses the continuation of SEC recordkeeping fines, with the most recent being against six agencies for $49 million.
In this Regulatory Wrap, we recount the latest round of fines from the SEC for “significant” recordkeeping violations. Like previous enforcements, this occurrence involved off-channel communications, showing that firms are still not meeting compliance expectations.
1. In enforcements occurring last year, Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) Commissioner Christy Goldsmith Romero stated that regulators “will not tolerate efforts to evade regulatory oversight”
2. Despite this warning, six credits agencies are the most recent to receive a cumulative $49 million in fines for recordkeeping failures
3. These enforcements involved personnel using their personal devices for text messaging and IM, including on channels like WhatsApp and WeChat
4. Senior managers were involved in all six instances, further contributing to the lacking “tone from the top” identified in preceding enforcements
5. As the most recent case in a perpetual line of record retention failures, the question remains why noncompliant communications persist
This episode is brought to you by our Head of Content, Jennifer Clarke.
Three years from the first major recordkeeping fine, it seems that firms have yet to get record retention policies in order. To avoid the censure of watchful regulators, it would behoove firms to consider implementing compliance solutions that capture business communications occurring on any channel.
