Gareth R. Hall

Connect: Read more about Gareth R. Hall
Firm/Organization: Greenberg Traurig, LLP
Blogs: Financial Services Observer, GT London Law Blog

Latest Articles

With the U.S. cannabis market reported to be worth around $10 billion, sales in Canada expected to reach $6.5 billion by 2020, and the UK having recently decriminalised the use of the drug for medicinal purposes, UK-based investors are eyeing the potential for profit from this new business area. Click here to read the full GT Advisory, where we consider what UK criminal laws will apply in this new, complex, and evolving area.…
It is widely thought that proceedings under the Proceeds of ‘Crime’ Act, such as confiscation, are intended to obtain the money someone makes from committing a crime. So, the thinking goes, if a person is convicted of fraud having made £100,000 from the crime, then those funds can be confiscated by the courts. While this basic premise is correct, UK money laundering laws are far broader in their application and are increasingly being used by…
Speaking on 4 April 2019, the head of enforcement for the UK FCA, Mark Steward, warned those subject to the UK’s anti-money laundering regulations that ‘it is time that the FCA gave effect to the full intention of the Money-Laundering Regulations which provides for criminal prosecutions’. He added: ‘[The FCA is] now conducting ‘dual track’ AML investigations, i.e., investigations into suspected breaches of the Money-Laundering Regulations that might give rise to either criminal or civil…
Figures provided by the UK’s Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) show that in spite of the thousands of tip-offs on insider dealing it receives from banks and other financial services firms, it rarely opens an investigation. In a response to a freedom of information (FOI) request made by Greenberg Traurig’s White Collar Defence and Special Investigations Practice, the FCA confirmed that as of 4 March 2019 it had opened 61 investigations into insider dealing since…
In a February 2019 speech, the FCA’s Director of Market Oversight, Julia Hoggett, said the following: The life blood of all well-functioning markets is the timely dissemination of information, without which effective price information cannot take place. The malignant form of that same life blood is the misuse or inappropriate dissemination of that information. The ‘malignant form’ to which Ms Hoggett referred is insider dealing, where someone trades on the basis of information not known…
Lisa Osofsky, the new director of the UK Serious Fraud Office, says her agency should use insiders and co-operators to bring to life by way of live evidence the document-heavy cases it prosecutes. Speaking to the Commons Justice Committee in December 2018, Ms Osofsky alluded to the slow pace of SFO investigations as one of the agency’s key criticisms and suggested that getting an ‘insider’ to help the SFO understand what was going on could…
On Feb. 7, 2019, the UK’s National Crime Agency (NCA) confirmed that it had obtained account forfeiture orders over money held in bank accounts in the name of the former Moldovan prime minister’s son, Vlad Luca Filat. Part III of our ‘Prove It or Lose It’ series anticipated the use of UK law enforcement authorities’ draconian new powers to obtain orders to freeze bank accounts and to apply for the forfeiture of money held in…
On 7 February 2019, the UK’s National Crime Agency (NCA) confirmed that it had obtained account forfeiture orders over money held in bank accounts in the name of the former Moldovan prime minister’s son, Vlad Luca Filat. Part III of our ‘Prove It or Lose It’ series anticipated the use of these draconian new powers of UK law enforcement authorities to obtain orders to freeze bank accounts and to apply for the forfeiture of money…
What does 2019 have in store for white-collar defence in the UK? In this GT Alert, we list our top 5 predictions relating to Serious Fraud Office (SFO) Director Lisa Osofsky, who indicated various areas of focus for her tenure; Brexit and the potential loss of the European Arrest Warrant regime and the U.K.’s access to EU shared crime agency databases; U.K. criminal law and corporate criminal liability; litigation privilege in the context of an internal criminal…
The term ‘market manipulation’ is a broad one which can mean a number of things. In this GT Advisory, we consider how market manipulation is approached in the U.K. in both a civil and criminal context, and how it has been enforced by the U.K.’s Financial Conduct Authority (FCA). We also discuss spoofing, a tactic used by traders to gain an unfair advantage. To continue reading, click here.…