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It's essentially a total ban with how ridiculously lengthy the approval process is. Usually if you want to make an individual trade, there will be a list of partners that have to approve your request. You need to individually email each one and get approval. It's unlikely you will get a 100% response rate, even less likely you will get 100% approvals from the responses you do receive, and nearly impossible to accomplish all of this in less than 2-3 weeks.Anonymous User wrote: ↑Sat Feb 18, 2023 3:11 pmpreclearance each time? total ban? i trade a lot of crypto and invest in stocks in my IRA.
Yes this is standard for almost every biglaw firm. It’s usually in your employee handbook. Most firms require you to annually certify that you’ve read the latest restricted list policy or handbook too.Anonymous User wrote: ↑Mon Feb 20, 2023 5:12 pmIs this normal elsewhere? I'm at a competitor firm, in lit, and wasn't aware of anything like this.
S&C allows buying and selling of Bitcoin and Ethereum without pre-clearance, but all other cryptos require pre-clearance (as do all stocks). Still, this was quite a 180 from as recently as slightly over a year ago, where it was a blanket ban on holding any crypto.Yardbird wrote: ↑Mon Feb 20, 2023 9:49 pmYes this is standard for almost every biglaw firm. It’s usually in your employee handbook. Most firms require you to annually certify that you’ve read the latest restricted list policy or handbook too.Anonymous User wrote: ↑Mon Feb 20, 2023 5:12 pmIs this normal elsewhere? I'm at a competitor firm, in lit, and wasn't aware of anything like this.
No but you may have to disclose your ownership for potential conflict analysis (for example, if you own stock in X company and are in a sales process where X company is a potential bidder on Y company, there’s a potential conflict). Note the firm may not require this but professional ethics rules for your state may require this. The firm may also be subject to certain requirements to disclose attorneys with ownership for FINRA purposes, in connection with bankruptcies and in connection with certain public transactions. Firms will send out questionnaires to every attorney in those instances to disclose the ownership.Anonymous User wrote: ↑Tue Feb 21, 2023 12:13 pmis it typical for a firm to require disclosure or divestiture of all individual assets/stock holdings prior to employment? or just clearance after beginning employment?
S&P 500 would be fine under that rule?Anonymous User wrote: ↑Wed Feb 22, 2023 2:13 amI have heard that Skadden effectively bans the trading of most common ETFs as well since any ETF which has a single stock making up more than 10% of the total holdings requires pre-clearance like a single stock so out goes S&P index.
Even the Dow is ok, though just barely (for the moment).The Lsat Airbender wrote: ↑Wed Feb 22, 2023 12:10 pmS&P 500 would be fine under that rule?Anonymous User wrote: ↑Wed Feb 22, 2023 2:13 amI have heard that Skadden effectively bans the trading of most common ETFs as well since any ETF which has a single stock making up more than 10% of the total holdings requires pre-clearance like a single stock so out goes S&P index.
I asked about this several years ago and was told by HR that not only is pre-clearance required for any trade, but the firm even wanted to know about any existing holdings including indexes (e.g. a 401k from previous employers, which seemed ridiculous to me). I doubt they'd seriously try to actually collect that info, but as a CYA exercise my impression was they were asking for any kind of securities holding, period. I was also chatting with another associate who casually mentioned that he'd been trading on Robinhood and it had never occurred to him to preclear, so clearly this stuff is on some people's radar much more than others.Yardbird wrote: ↑Wed Feb 22, 2023 2:19 amNo but you may have to disclose your ownership for potential conflict analysis (for example, if you own stock in X company and are in a sales process where X company is a potential bidder on Y company, there’s a potential conflict). Note the firm may not require this but professional ethics rules for your state may require this. The firm may also be subject to certain requirements to disclose attorneys with ownership for FINRA purposes, in connection with bankruptcies and in connection with certain public transactions. Firms will send out questionnaires to every attorney in those instances to disclose the ownership.Anonymous User wrote: ↑Tue Feb 21, 2023 12:13 pmis it typical for a firm to require disclosure or divestiture of all individual assets/stock holdings prior to employment? or just clearance after beginning employment?
Generally as a rule, you do not have to divest before you start in biglaw but you may want to since you could be prohibited from exiting a poor investment because of trading restrictions. Folks I knew who had substantial investments either liquidated stocks into ETFs or transferred their stocks to an advisor who had discretionary** control over the account (and then firm restrictions don’t apply).
**discretionary meaning you can’t direct the advisor to buy or sell anything but can direct them that you need X amount of money by Y date and they can then liquidate things as they deem advisable to get you the money you need
what firm?Anonymous User wrote: ↑Wed Feb 22, 2023 3:22 pmI asked about this several years ago and was told by HR that not only is pre-clearance required for any trade, but the firm even wanted to know about any existing holdings including indexes (e.g. a 401k from previous employers, which seemed ridiculous to me). I doubt they'd seriously try to actually collect that info, but as a CYA exercise my impression was they were asking for any kind of securities holding, period. I was also chatting with another associate who casually mentioned that he'd been trading on Robinhood and it had never occurred to him to preclear, so clearly this stuff is on some people's radar much more than others.Yardbird wrote: ↑Wed Feb 22, 2023 2:19 amNo but you may have to disclose your ownership for potential conflict analysis (for example, if you own stock in X company and are in a sales process where X company is a potential bidder on Y company, there’s a potential conflict). Note the firm may not require this but professional ethics rules for your state may require this. The firm may also be subject to certain requirements to disclose attorneys with ownership for FINRA purposes, in connection with bankruptcies and in connection with certain public transactions. Firms will send out questionnaires to every attorney in those instances to disclose the ownership.Anonymous User wrote: ↑Tue Feb 21, 2023 12:13 pmis it typical for a firm to require disclosure or divestiture of all individual assets/stock holdings prior to employment? or just clearance after beginning employment?
Generally as a rule, you do not have to divest before you start in biglaw but you may want to since you could be prohibited from exiting a poor investment because of trading restrictions. Folks I knew who had substantial investments either liquidated stocks into ETFs or transferred their stocks to an advisor who had discretionary** control over the account (and then firm restrictions don’t apply).
**discretionary meaning you can’t direct the advisor to buy or sell anything but can direct them that you need X amount of money by Y date and they can then liquidate things as they deem advisable to get you the money you need