Unusual SEC Request on Musk Lawsuit Raises Internal Concerns
Source: Bloomberg
Unusual SEC Request on Musk Lawsuit Raises Internal Concerns
Anthony Cormier, Nicola M White, Jason Leopold and Lydia Beyoud
Tue, February 25, 2025 at 9:08 AM EST 8 min read
(Bloomberg) -- A high-ranking official at the Securities and Exchange Commission asked enforcement staff members in January to declare that a case they wanted to bring against Elon Musk was not motivated by politics, an unusual request that the staffers refused, according to three people familiar with the matter.
The case went forward, but that request from Commissioner Mark Uyeda, a Republican who is now serving as the commission’s acting chairman, has contributed to a growing sense of unease inside an SEC division that handles high-stakes securities cases, according to the people, who asked not to be named for fear of retaliation.
Uyeda’s request came shortly before the SEC met behind closed doors to vote on whether to follow the enforcement staff’s recommendation to sue Musk in a case related to his acquisition of the social media platform Twitter in 2022, the people said. The staff’s case alleged that in March of that year, Musk missed a deadline to disclose that he’d amassed a significant stake in the company, a failure that kept share prices low for several additional days as he bought more.
After the enforcement team of lawyers and supervisors declined to comply with Uyeda’s request, the agency’s five appointed commissioners met privately to decide the fate of their case in early January. The SEC filed the lawsuit against Musk the following week, days before President Donald Trump took the oath of office. Votes of SEC members are decided by simple majority and generally kept confidential until any resulting litigation is resolved in court.
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Read more: https://www.yahoo.com/news/sec-official-sought-staff-no-140807220.html
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