Good morning. The Supreme Court on Monday heard challenges to the independent enforcement powers of the Federal Trade Commission and the Securities and Exchange Commission.

The FTC suit was filed by Axon Enterprise Inc., the maker of Tasers and other police equipment. It was followed Monday by arguments in a similar case about securities regulators, together comprising the latest attack on the federal enforcement agencies’ in-house courts. Agencies such as the FTC and the SEC use administrative courts in which judges, who are employees of the agency, rule on the legality of mergers or decide punishments for alleged violations of consumer or securities laws.

Plaintiffs in both cases allege that FTC and SEC administrative-law judges who hear civil actions are too difficult for the president or his appointees to remove. The legal issue before the Supreme Court is whether parties facing enforcement actions can bring arguments against the commission structure to federal court before completing administrative proceedings—or must wait to lose in agency proceedings before they can raise such constitutional questions in federal court.

At Monday’s arguments, some conservative justices suggested it would be better for the agencies and those they regulate to get such matters into federal court quickly.

Speakers at the WSJ Risk & Compliance Forum on Nov. 16 include Brian Nelson from the U.S. Treasury Department and Robert Silvers from the Department of Homeland Security, along with multiple experts on corporate risk and compliance. Sign up here for discussions on economic sanctions, forced labor, climate change regulation, whistleblowers and cybersecurity.

DOJ seizes Bitcoin once valued at $3.36 billion. The Justice Department said on Monday it had seized cryptocurrency once valued at $3.36 billion from a Georgia man who pleaded guilty to stealing bitcoin from the Silk Road online marketplace.

The cryptocurrency seizure, which took place in November 2021 and hadn’t been publicly announced, is the second largest in Justice Department history. The government is seeking the forfeiture of the seized bitcoin, which has declined significantly in value since the seizure and is now worth about $1 billion.

Job postings with broad pay ranges leave applicants guessing. As companies publish pay details for job openings under new laws in New York City, some are listing maximum pay figures that are more than double the minimum pay for the job, stretching salary ranges to hundreds of thousands of dollars for certain careers.

A trauma surgeon in the Mount Sinai Health System could earn anywhere from $384,000 to $800,000 or more, the hospital’s job ads say. A tax executive at PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP could make $158,400—or nearly triple that. At AT&T Inc., a principal cloud architect could be paid $206,000 or $103,000.

“It’s just incredibly frustrating,” said Hang Xu, a user-experience designer in New York who has been searching for a new role and said he is annoyed to see ranges for many roles spanning tens of thousands of dollars. “It’s completely useless from a negotiation standpoint.”

In other compliance-related news...

• John R. Tyson, Tyson Foods Inc.’s chief financial officer and son of the meat giant’s chairman, was arrested over the weekend after authorities said he fell asleep in the wrong house.
   
• Companies are asking lawmakers to repeal a change in the tax code that requires businesses to spread their research-and-development costs over five years rather than deduct them immediately.

Corporate executives call for action-based approach at COP27. Business leaders are pushing for specific actions to combat climate change and asking for clearer policies to support such initiatives from governments at the United Nations climate summit in Egypt.

Top executives of 101 companies penned an open letter last week urging governments and companies to support existing solutions to meet the goals of the 2015 Paris Agreement, which aims to keep global warming well below 2 degrees Celsius by the end of the century.

The last eight years have each been warmer than all years before that period on record, according to a report by the World Meteorological Organization that was released Sunday.

• U.S. Seeks Billions in Carbon Credits to Wean Countries Off Fossil Fuels
• Clipped Green Claims at COP27 Might Signal Progress
• Egypt Food Supply in Danger as Farmers Struggle With Climate Change

Hedge-fund manager who helped expose Luckin Coffee’s fraud bets on its comeback. A hedge-fund manager who secretly wrote a scathing report in 2020 that accused Luckin Coffee Inc. of accounting fraud is now backing the Chinese chain, calling it “a miracle in China’s business history.”

Snow Lake Capital, a Beijing-based hedge fund founded and run by Sean Ma, has bought a minority stake in Luckin and is betting that the formerly Nasdaq-listed company’s valuation will surge, the investor said in an interview with The Wall Street Journal on Monday.

Sanctions on Russian energy loom over oil market. Sanctions on Russia will redraw global oil flows over the next three months. Confusion over how the measures will work is making it hard for the energy industry to prepare.

Ukraine’s allies are gearing up to hit Russian oil with the toughest restrictions to date starting in early December, an attempt to stem President Vladimir Putin’s influx of fossil-fuel revenue.

Negotiations inside the Biden administration and with its overseas partners are going down to the wire, creating uncertainty for traders, refiners and other players in the energy market. Adding to the angst, Moscow has threatened to hit back by choking off supplies.

• Russia Presses Evacuation of Kherson as Ukrainian Offensive Looms
• Zelensky Sets Conditions for ‘Genuine’ Peace Talks With Russia

Companies look for ways to bring new directors up to speed quickly. In a rapidly changing political and business environment, board members have much more on their plates these days. They must figure out the impact of a host of novel challenges, everything from the Russia-Ukraine war to economic uncertainty to a heightened focus on environmental, social and governance issues. They often need and want specialized training to integrate into board dynamics and stay up to speed on the issues.

A number of companies are trying new strategies to make sure their directors are up to the challenge—from assigning mentors to holding one-on-one meetings with the full management team to arranging visits to company facilities.

The move is one of the first by Mr. Musk, a self-described free-speech absolutist, to tighten Twitter Inc.’s free-speech policies. He said on Sunday that impersonating accounts will be permanently suspended unless they are specified as parody.

Covid’s drag on the workforce proves persistent. Two-and-a-half years after Covid-19 emerged, reported infections are way down, pandemic restrictions are practically gone and life in many respects is approaching normal. The labor force, however, is not.

Researchers say the virus is having a persistent effect, keeping millions out of work and reducing the productivity and hours of millions more, disrupting business operations and raising costs.

In the average month this year, nearly 630,000 more workers missed at least a week of work because of illness than in the years before the pandemic, according to Labor Department data. That is a reduction in workers equal to about 0.4 percent of the labor force, a significant amount in a tight labor market. That share is up about 0.1 percentage point from the same period last year, the data show.

• Apple iPhone Assembler Tried to Ease Worker Fears About Covid—It Led to a Tighter Lockdown