Can the SEC stand up to the richest man on the planet?

[Jilly_in_VA]

Elon Musk has hurled insults and belittled the Securities and Exchange Commission and has even expressed complete disdain for Wall Street's top cop.

Musk called the SEC "bastards" at a recent conference. He tweeted a vulgar innuendo in 2020. He said, "I do not respect the SEC," in a 2018 interview. And after he amassed a significant stake in Twitter this year, Musk filed required paperwork 11 days late.

"You know, Elon Musk is basically saying, 'Come at me. I dare you,'" says Christine Chung, a professor at Albany Law School. She used to be a lawyer in the SEC's Division of Enforcement.

Musk continues to goad the SEC even though the agency has taken multiple actions against him, from fining him millions of dollars to accusing him of securities fraud. In a recent letter, the SEC asked Musk to elaborate on public comments he made about Twitter and to also explain why he didn't file a mandatory disclosure on time.

All this is reigniting a debate about whether the SEC has sharp enough teeth to rein in powerful and wealthy executives like Musk.

https://www.npr.org/2022/06/04/1102327987/elon-musk-sec-tweets-lawsuit-power

[Eyeball_Kid]

1. Another version of the same question:

Is Musk one of many billionaires who are controlling the US government?

Are the voters in control of their government, or are the wealthy? Musk is one of the wealthy who are forcing the government to answer that question. Those who are watching, with a good degree of alarm, the rise of fascism in the US, are also asking the same question.

[Backseat Driver]

5. Well, it wasn't as if the SEC wasn't often warned, and often w/documentation, about Bernie Madoff's

ponzi scheme

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/the-man-who-figured-out-madoffs-scheme-27-02-2009/

[haele]

2. He's not going to be the richest man much longer...

Musk isn't very liquid.
Most of his Billions are in stock, funds, etc. Like most very rich men, he lives on credit based on his assumed net worth.
His company's stock starts dropping, there's not a lot of actual capital there to recover. The fact that he's talking about cutting new hires and labor when his competition is increasing labor and capital investments is a big indication that something is wrong.

Just Business Econ 101 type speculation.

Haele

[bucolic_frolic]

3. Abusing the markets with size and noise is supposed to be clamped down on

Investors got lurched when he filed that paperwork late because his position was larger than it would have been had he filed it according to the rules. Yours truly got whomped more than a bit in that flotsam. Suddenly the charts were not doing what was anticipated. If the SEC doesn't use it they're going to lose it.

[sop]

4. Twitter will be a great platform for Musk's stock manipulation.

[dalton99a]

6. Elon Uber Alles

Rules and regulations are for mortals.

They don't apply to the Greatest Genius in World History

[Chainfire]

7. Musk is of the protected class and immune to the laws of citizens.

It is the power of the almighty dollar.

[XanaDUer2]

8. I thought Putin was richest man on Earth nt