Highlights
Michael Ostheimer, a senior staff attorney for the Federal Trade Commission (FTC), joined Holland & Knight for a recent webinar presentation on social media advertising and marketing practices.
This Holland & Knight alert provides a number of key takeaways from that discussion, which includes best practice tips and inside information that can help companies enhance their regulatory compliance programs and minimize their risks associated with social media advertising and marketing. These takeaways apply to every business in every single industry sector in our economy that promotes its products or services to consumers – from financial services firms to healthcare products to retailers.
REGULATORY DEVELOPMENTS
On February 4, the SEC published a request for public comment regarding potential reform measures for money market funds, as highlighted in a recent report of the President’s Working Group on Financial Markets (PWG). The PWG report discussed the results of the PWG’s study on the effect of the COVID-19 pandemic on the short-term funding markets and, in particular, on money market funds, including the general stress experienced by prime and tax-exempt money market funds. The report concluded that the events of March 2020 show that more work is needed to reduce the risk that structural vulnerabilities in prime and tax-exempt money market funds will exacerbate or lead to stresses in short-term funding markets. The potential reform measures as outlined in the PWG report seek to: (i) address money market funds’ structural vulnerabilities that can contribute to stress in short-term funding markets; (ii) improve the resilience of money market funds and broader
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On January 29, 2021, the FTC announced that it filed a proposed settlement in the District of Nevada with two Nevada-based consulting companies, resolving claims that the companies violated the FTC Act, Telemarketing and Consumer Fraud and Abuse Prevention Act, Telemarketing Sales Rule, Credit Repair Organizations Act, and Consumer Review Fairness Act.
The FTC alleged that, since 2013, the two companies charged consumers to obtain “funding” to pay for trainings offered by a number of third-party companies with whom the companies partnered. The trainings consisted of seminar and coaching packages costing tens of thousands of dollars that purported to teach consumers how to make money by investing in real estate or operating an online business. The FTC alleged that the third-party training companies referred consumers to the defendants, who in turn charged consumers fees of $3,000 or more to submit nu
Consumers Forced Into Credit Card Debt for Marketing Company
2 months ago
Two Nevada companies and two individuals have agreed to stop charging consumers thousands of dollars to apply for multiple credit cards in their names in order to pay for expensive and often ineffective training programs under a proposed settlement of a Federal Trade Commission lawsuit.
The FTC filed a federal court complaint along with a proposed settlement which requires the defendants to stop obtaining credit cards for consumers for a fee. In addition, the defendants will be required to pay $2.1 million under the proposed settlement, which will be distributed by the FTC to consumers.