A quasi-governmental agency that polices the investment industry has come up with a plan to make it simpler for consumers to avoid shady money managers -- but it includes no provisions to make the underlying data available to the public.
The Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA), a Self-Regulatory Organization (SRO) that polices the investment industry, was charged to come up with a proposal to make it simpler for consumers to find out whether the broker-dealers and investment advisers they consult have a history of disciplinary problems. This could be anything from multimillion dollar fines levied by authorities to felony counts to ...
Continue readingTransparencyCamp 2012: It’s Coming.
Robots and gentlepeople, it is with great pleasure that I announce (and humbly invite you to attend) Sunlight’s fifth TransparencyCamp,... View Article
Continue readingConsumer groups protest disappearance of doctor discipline data
[(Photo from the Kansas City Star website.)
[Note: this post has been corrected. Please read the note at the bottom, and comments, for further clarification.]
Reporters' and consumers' groups are protesting the Obama administration's decision to remove from the web a database of disciplinary actions and malpractice suits against physicians. The file, which has been online and publicly available since 2001, hides the names of individual doctors.
But that hasn't stopped reporters over the past decade from doing just that, using ...
One out of ten investment advisers disciplined
Throughout his career as a broker-dealer, Anthony Gerard Manaia has been fired twice. He’s been the subject of 18 complaints by disgruntled investors, most of whom accused him of putting their money in risky investments without their knowledge. He’s currently under investigation for his role in a scandal around offerings by a medical financing company that a federal agency has accused of misappropriating investor funds.
In July 2010 Manaia gave up his broker-dealer registration. Five months later, in January 2011, he hung out his shingle as an investment adviser. His website targets “high net worth individuals” and says ...
Good investor data are hard to find
In a recent report to Congress, mandated by the Dodd-Frank financial overhaul law, the SEC maintained that "because selecting a broker-dealer or investment adviser is one of the most important decisions that investors face, information to help them make this choice should be easy to find, easy to use, and easy to understand."
But if you do a simple google search for the name of your broker or investment adviser and “disciplinary action” or “fine” you are unlikely to come up with much. While the information on broker-dealers and investment advisers is all a matter of public record, you need ...
Continue readingRAT Board: Build a “universal one-stop shop” for federal spending transparency
by Jacob Hutt, Policy Intern The government’s point person for Recovery Act transparency and accountability called for an online “universal... View Article
Continue readingLocal watchdogging starts with one good question
When it comes down to it, beyond the ideal of “transparent governance,” everyone in the open government movement is looking... View Article
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