Matthew C. Solomon

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On November 15, 2017, the Securities and Exchange Commission Division of Enforcement released its annual report detailing its priorities for the coming year and evaluating enforcement actions that occurred during Fiscal Year 2017.   The Report captures the SEC during a period of transition and provides insight into changes in the SEC’s approach to enforcement actions…

On September 12, 2017, Governance Watch and Cleary Gottlieb Steen & Hamilton LLP hosted a panel discussion on “Recent Whistleblower Issues.”  Participants in the panel discussion included Matthew Solomon, a partner at Cleary Gottlieb and former Chief Litigation Counsel at the SEC’s Division of Enforcement; Emily Pasquinelli, Deputy Chief of the SEC’s Office of the Whistleblower; David Huntley, Chief Compliance Officer of AT&T; and Steven Durham, a Partner at Labaton Sucharow LLP who specializes in plaintiffs-side whistleblower representations.  The panelists discussed issues critical to U.S. public companies and foreign private issuers relating to federal whistleblower programs.  Below are the key takeaways from the discussion.
Continue Reading Recent Whistleblower Issues: Key Takeaways from the Conference Board’s Governance Watch Webcast

On April 27, a civil FCPA litigation against three former executives of a Hungarian telecommunications company officially came to a close after more than five years of contentious litigation in the Southern District of New York when Judge Richard Sullivan approved the settlements of the last two defendants and entered judgment in the matter.  The case alleged that three former executives of Magyar Telekom, Plc., a Hungarian telecommunications company, participated in a scheme between 2004 and 2006 to bribe public officials in Macedonia in order to secure favorable treatment for Magyar’s Macedonian subsidiary.  All three defendants were foreign nationals working for an overseas company; the charged conduct took place exclusively on foreign soil; and the defendants continue to reside overseas.
Continue Reading SEC, Hungarian Executives Settle 5-Year FCPA Suit that Generated Government-Friendly Rulings on Threshold Legal Issues

Several sources have reported that Acting SEC Chair Michael Piwowar recently issued a directive mandating that only the Acting Director of the Division of Enforcement can authorize the issuance of formal orders of investigation, the means by which the SEC authorizes its investigative staff to issue subpoenas.[1]  The change—which reportedly strips approximately 20 Enforcement Division senior officers of the power to authorize formal orders—was not announced publicly and is not reflected in the SEC’s Enforcement Manual.
Continue Reading Acting SEC Chair Michael Piwowar Takes Steps to Centralize the Process of Issuing Formal Orders – Are Commentators Drawing the Right Lessons?

Earlier this month, following three hours of deliberation, a California federal jury found that Bio-Rad Laboratories, Inc. had violated the federal whistleblower provisions by unlawfully firing Sanford Wadler, its former general counsel, and awarded Wadler nearly $11 million in damages.  Wadler had sued his former company under the Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002, the Dodd-Frank Act and California state law, asserting that he was wrongfully terminated in retaliation for investigating and reporting to senior management potential violations of the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (“FCPA”) in China.  The pre-trial proceedings and three-week trial involved several whistleblower-friendly rulings that promise to generate additional litigation.  Those legal determinations, as well as the jury’s prompt finding of liability and imposition of a substantial award in the face of an aggressive corporate defense, bring to the forefront significant issues relevant to public companies, directors and other corporate stakeholders – not the least of which is the precedent of a general counsel in the role of whistleblower. 
Continue Reading Jury Awards Ousted General Counsel Nearly $11 Million in Whistleblower Retaliation Action – Key Takeaways