To: Anthony@Pacific who wrote (58 ) 1/25/1999 1:11:00 PM From: Anthony@Pacific Respond to of 397
NASD are a bunch of corrupt losers which is a privat comapmny trying to pass itself off as a GOVT agency......see below Jan 25, 1999 NASD May Have Disciplined Brokers Without Authority to Do So, Court Says By JOHN R. EMSHWILLER Staff Reporter of THE WALL STREET JOURNAL A federal appeals-court decision has raised the possibility that the National Association of Securities Dealers may for years have disciplined brokers in certain cases without the authority to do so. The decision last week by a three-judge federal appeals-court panel in New York overturned an NASD disciplinary action against brokerage-firm owner John Fiero. In 1996, Mr. Fiero was censured, fined $20,000 and threatened with suspension for failing to comply fully with interview requests in an NASD investigation into his stock-trading activities, according to a copy of the court decision. In its ruling, the appeals-court panel found the NASD's market-surveillance committee didn't have the power to compel Mr. Fiero to talk and, therefore, couldn't punish him for failing to do so. The committee was created in 1983. But it wasn't until August 1996 -- several months after the Fiero dispute began -- that the committee was explicitly granted powers by the Securities and Exchange Commission to compel members to cooperate in investigations, the court found. The SEC oversees NASD activities, and its 1996 decision was part of a larger agency pronouncement regarding NASD powers. Private securities attorneys say it was unnoticed until the Fiero case when the issue was raised by the judges during oral arguments. Alden Adkins, general counsel for the NASD's regulation unit, said the impact of the court decision "will be minuscule." He said he believes the court's ruling would affect only pre-August 1996 cases that are still open and he doesn't know of any such cases. But others say the ruling could have important repercussions. Martin Kaplan, Mr. Fiero's lawyer, predicted it could lead to the reopening of "numerous cases" and said he plans to review other clients' cases to see if they might be affected. Anthony W. Djinis, a Washington attorney, said the court decision "has some far-reaching implications." He added he already has been called by a former client asking whether his NASD disciplinary action could be reopened in light of the ruling. NASD records for the first eight months of 1996 show several dozen cases where failing to respond to information requests was cited as at least part of the reason for barring or otherwise punishing a broker. NASD officials said they couldn't immediately say how many of its past disciplinary cases involved the market-surveillance committee. Other parts of the NASD prior to 1996 did have the power to compel members to cooperate in investigations. Whatever the repercussions of the case, some attorneys believe the court decision is a rebuke to the NASD and the SEC, which approved the penalties against Mr. Fiero and which was the named party in the broker's appeals-court case. The decision "is important in that it says to the securities regulators that they must obey the law just like everybody else," said Lawrence Iason, former head of the SEC's New York office and now a private attorney doing securities-defense work. An SEC spokesman declined to comment on the court ruling. Last year, the NASD's regulatory unit filed a disciplinary complaint against Mr. Fiero and his firm, Fiero Brothers Inc., and several others. The still-pending complaint contends the defendants "acting in collusion, engaged in a manipulative 'bear raid' to drive down the price" of 10 stocks traded on the Nasdaq Stock Market. Mr. Fiero and his firm have denied wrongdoing.