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More on Mark Cuban

By Gordon Smith, Christine, Hurt, Vic Fleischer, Fred Tung, Lisa Fairfax, David Zaring

Over at The Deal Professor, Davidoff's colleague Peter J. Henning has a take that's skeptical both of Cuban's claims and the SEC's motives for going after him. A taste:

The S.E.C. needs to establish its presence as the market policeman, there to protect investors. Yet in recent years the commission, whether by choice or legal restriction, allowed wide swaths of the market to go largely unregulated. The courts rejected the S.E.C.?s assertion of authority to regulate hedge funds. The commission let Wall Street firms increase their leverage and employ their own internal risk assessment models, allowing them to invest heavily in mortgage-backed securities and other real estate investment vehicles. That decision allowed companies like Lehman to put themselves at risk when the housing market cratered. There was no cop within a hundred miles of that decision.

So the commission decides to pick a fight with Mark Cuban in a case that may not be all that easy to win. The typical insider trading case involves someone with a fiduciary responsibility to a company, such as an officer, employee or outside adviser, who trades in the shares. Mr. Cuban was an investor in Mamma.com, and its management sought to interest him in the PIPE deal, which did not make him very happy. But owning shares in a company does not make one a fiduciary, and there are no restrictions on the right to sell one?s shares.

WSJ's Law Blog has more on the emails between Cuban and Jeffrey Norris of the SEC, criticizing Cuban's patriotism.

Is it wrong that I have a soft spot for a blog maverick?

Full post as published by Conglomerate on November 20, 2008 (boomark / email).