Corporate theft can happen in any workplace, but in the world of financial services, the theft can also create regulatory and litigation exposure for financial institutions. What type of employee is most likely to steal from the company or its customers? What can companies do to combat this? Partners Tracey Diamond and Evan Gibbs chatted with Troutman Pepper Partner Chris Willis about the popular movie Office Space, employee misconduct, and creative uses of technology to protect against corporate theft.

At a White House Roundtable on protecting Americans from allegedly harmful “data broker” practices, Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB or Bureau) Director Rohit Chopra announced the Bureau’s intention to expand the reach of the Fair Credit Reporting Act (FCRA) to data brokers. He stated, “Next month, the CFPB will publish an outline of proposals and alternatives under consideration for a proposed rule. We’ll soon hear from small businesses, which will help us craft the rule.”

On August 9, the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) sent a letter to U.S. District Judge Analisa Torres requesting leave to file an interlocutory appeal in SEC v. Ripple Labs, Inc. as to the two adverse liability determinations in her July 13, 2023 order. That order granted partial summary judgment in Ripple Labs’ favor regarding the sale of its XRP token. As we previously discussed here, the court held in deciding cross motions for summary judgment that defendants’ “programmatic” offers and sales to XRP buyers over crypto asset trading platforms and Ripple’s “other distributions” in exchange for labor and services did not involve the offer or sale of securities under the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision in SEC v. W.J. Howey Co.

On August 8, the Federal Reserve Board (Fed) issued a press release providing additional information on its Novel Activities Supervision Program (Program) to monitor novel activities in the banks it oversees. Novel activities are defined to include: (1) technology-driven partnerships with non-banks to provide banking services to customers, and (2) activities involving crypto-assets and distributed ledger or “blockchain” technology. According to the Fed, “the Program will be risk-focused and complement existing supervisory processes, strengthening the oversight of novel activities conducted by supervised banking organizations.” The Fed will notify those banking organizations whose novel activities will be subject to examination in writing and will routinely monitor supervised banking organizations that are exploring novel activities.

On August 10, two credit union trade associations — Credit Union National Association (CUNA) and Cornerstone Credit Union League — and Rally Credit Union (collectively, Proposed Intervenors) filed an Unopposed Emergency Motion for Leave to Intervene, arguing that they will suffer irreparable harm if the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB or Bureau) is not enjoined from enforcing the small business data collection and reporting final rule under § 1071 of the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act (Final Rule) against them. This filing comes just three days after CUNA and the National Association of Federally-Insured Credit Unions (NAFCU) sent a joint letter to the CFPB urging it to stay enforcement and implementation of the Final Rule for all covered financial institutions until after the U.S. Supreme Court’s final decision in Community Financial Services Association (CFSA) v. CFPB (discussed here).

On August 8, a unanimous panel of the Ninth Circuit issued a decision affirming a district court’s partial dismissal judgment entered in Trim v. Reward Zone USA LLC, holding that text messages did not use prerecorded voices under the Telephone Consumer Protection Act (TCPA) because they did not include audible components.

On August 8, bankers associations from all 50 states sent a joint letter to the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB or Bureau) urging it to stay enforcement and implementation of the small business data collection and reporting final rule under § 1071 of the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act (Final Rule) for all covered financial institutions until after the U.S. Supreme Court’s final decision in Community Financial Services Association (CFSA) v. CFPB. The banking trade groups argued that relief should be provided to banks nationwide to “be prudent and ameliorate confusion.”

In this episode of The Crypto Exchange, Troutman Pepper Partner Ethan Ostroff welcomes his colleagues Carlin McCrory and Addison Morgan to discuss a recent case in the Southern District of New York that has been in the news, Rider v. Uphold HQ. In Rider, the court concluded that virtual currency platform operators may be subject to the Electronic Fund Transfer Act (EFTA) and Regulation E.