From shocking to encouraging, there were five stories that warrant a second look and may have legs in 2025.
Grygo is the chief content officer for FTF & FTF News.
Last year was a rollercoaster ride that will serve as prelude for the adventures to come in 2025. But before the next ride, let’s step back for a moment and look at some of the downright unusual stories we covered in 2024. They deserve a second look because they ran the gamut from shocking to encouraging and are likely to have repercussions in the year ahead.
- The Most Shocking Story of the Year: “FBI Thwarts Attempt to Bomb NYSE”
The lead paragraph still sends chills down my spine: “A bombing outside the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) building at 11 Wall Street in Manhattan was thwarted by an undercover operation led by agents of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) who arrested Harun Abdul-Malik Yener and charged him with attempting to build explosives that would kill as many as possible to ‘reboot’ the U.S. government.”
More details are likely to emerge but Yener, a homeless man from Coral Springs, Fla., was ultimately stopped by a special FBI agent in the Miami Field Office after a tip about Yener’s activities. After a search, special agents “found bombmaking sketches, numerous watches with timers, electronic circuit boards, and other electronics in Yener’s storage unit that could be used for constructing explosive devices,” according to the FBI affidavit. The FBI and others are the unsung heroes here – they prevented what could have been a horrific event. Here’s a link to the story: https://shorturl.at/PrnkD
- The Most Startling Story About a Regulator: “Should the GAO Audit the CFTC?”
Caroline D. Pham, a Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) commissioner, began an Open Meeting last May with a bang when she declared that the U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO) should investigate the CFTC because it has “expanded its jurisdiction without a proper mandate, and, as a consequence, has strayed far from its mission.”
Pham later posted online, “The CFTC Needs to Get Serious: A Strategic Plan for Reform,” a direct challenge to the CFTC’s ban on “event contracts,” which are derivatives contracts using elections, awards, or sports competitions as the basis for the contracts. Ultimately, Pham argues that the GAO should audit basically everything the CFTC does. Usually the GAO requests come from outside the organization.
We contacted CFTC and GAO media representatives to get their responses to Pham’s statement. While CFTC officials declined to comment, a GAO spokesperson said the next move is up to the U.S. Congress.
“However, we do our work specifically at the request of Congress. So should we receive a request like this from Congress, we would then certainly consider starting such work,” Chuck Young, managing director, public affairs for the GAO, told FTF News. Given that there’s a new Congress that says it wants to shake things, this story may have legs. Pham’s full statement is here: https://bit.ly/44R8yPN. Our story can be found here: https://shorturl.at/iKpC9
- The Most Intriguing Story About Exchanges: “Is Wall Street Ready for 24-Hour Trading?”
Major media gave short shrift to the news that the SEC approved the registration application of 24X National Exchange, LLC, which plans to operate a nearly round-the-clock trading exchange. If 24X takes off, it has the potential to upset the status quo of global trading. As proposed, the 24X National Exchange will facilitate trading in U.S. securities 23 hours each day, five days a week for broker-dealers who are approved members of the new exchange.
“The extended hour trading is subject to Equity Data Plans making changes that would facilitate overnight trading hours and 24X National Exchange making an additional rule filing with the SEC confirming the changes and the Exchange’s ability to comply with the Securities Exchange Act,” according to the 24X announcement. It will be exciting to see how this situation pans out in 2025. You can find our story here: https://shorturl.at/qMhxX
- The Most Inspiring Story About Bipartisanship: “SEC Green-Lights Half-Penny Stocks”
The SEC often reflects where the country is as far as politics, the economy, and the culture. The outgoing SEC Chair Gary Gensler had his share of challenges last year with the loyal opposition. However, there was a rare bipartisan, unanimous decision in September when the commissioners adopted amendments to the Regulation National Market System (NMS) rules. The changes allow U.S. stock exchanges to have transactions via increments of half a penny — a new minimum pricing increment or tick size. While there was unanimous support, SEC Commissioner Hester M. Peirce, part of the loyal opposition, expressed her concerns in depth. In the end, she supported the amendments because they “should reduce operational complexity and potential investor confusion, allow tick-constrained stocks to trade at prices more closely approximating their natural levels, permit continued competition across exchange and non-exchange trading platforms, and lower investors’ costs of trading.” Our story can be found here: https://shorturl.at/cBC5h
- The Most Encouraging Story: “FTX Clients to Get Refunds via Bankruptcy Plan”
The massive cryptocurrency scandal involving Sam Bankman-Fried and the subsequent trials and tribulations involving FTX Trading Ltd. (d.b.a. FTX.com) got a lot of headlines. Yet the news posse skims over the victims and on to the next shiny scandal. However, the bankruptcy estate of FTX had follow-up news last year for its affiliated debtors via the U. S. Bankruptcy Court for the District of Delaware. FTX filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in November 2022 and its affiliated debtors and debtors-in-possession filed for relief under Title 11 of the Bankruptcy Code via the bankruptcy court of Delaware.
The bankruptcy court “confirmed FTX’s Plan of Reorganization, less than two years after its historic bankruptcy filing,” according to the FTC bankruptcy estate. “Under the terms of the plan, 98 percent of the creditors of FTX by number will receive approximately 119 percent of the amount of their allowed claims within 60 days after the effective date of the plan, subject to know-your-customer and other distribution requirements,” according to the official announcement. This story is encouraging because it serves as proof that there are times when the system works and the victims literally and figuratively get their day in court. We hope there is more good news for the victims in 2025. More details can be found here: https://tinyurl.com/5492zjs5
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