Affinity investment fraud is a big problem in the United States, according to regulators. Fraudsters take advantage of a presumption in the minds of victims that a person with whom you have something in common is trustworthy. That this is not necessarily so was demonstrated once again when deaf investors lost $3.45 million to “one […]
Matt Taibbi’s recent Rolling Stone article entitled “Is the SEC Covering Up Wall Street’s Crimes?” questions whether corruption plagues the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. In that article Taibbi meticulously contends that Wall Street banks and their law firms have, over and over again, shut down fraud investigations by influencing senior SEC officials, who later […]
The association of state securities regulators known as NASAA has released its top 10 investment traps. NASAA finds that scam artists are peddling various get-rich-quick schemes to take advantage of the economic uncertainty. According to NASAA, investments that investors should be particularly wary of include distressed real estate schemes, energy investments, gold and precious metal […]
More than a year after it was created by the Dodd-Frank financial reform act, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) opened its Office of the Whistleblower on August 12, 2011. According to a statement released by SEC Director of Enforcement Robert Khuzami, “early and quick law enforcement action is the key to preventing securities […]
When the markets go haywire, the financial scam artists come out of the woodwork. According to attorney H. Davis of the securities and arbitration law firm Page Perry, “with the recent extreme market volatility, investors looking for security can be increasingly easy targets for financial scam artists.” According to Mr. Davis, “in times of financial […]
Professional athletes and coaches are often prime targets of investment promoters, some of whom purport to be their trusted friends and advisers. Unfortunately, the investments these “advisers” sell sometimes turn out to be something entirely different from what they were represented to be, resulting in hundreds of thousands, even millions, of dollars in losses, according […]
Senior financial abuse is a growing problem and financial advisors and accountants are best able to detect senior financial abuse, even better than a family member, according to Liz Skinner’s InvestmentNews article entitled “Identifying elder financial fraud.” That is because knowledgeable professionals who regularly review their financial documents are more apt to see changes in […]
Describing JP Morgan Chase as an “active enabler” that “knew” about the fraud being perpetrated by Bernard Madoff, the Madoff bankruptcy trustee has amended his complaint against JPMorgan Chase to increase the amount of compensatory damages claimed from $5.4 billion to $19 billion, an amount that is based on the trustee’s latest estimate of principal […]
UBS and other Wall Street banks have found a way to profit from the Madoff ponzi scheme, swooping in like vultures to snap up claims from defrauded investors at a fraction of their nominal value, according to Michael Rothfield’s Wall Street Journal article entitled “Madoff Claims Lure Banks.” At the same time, UBS is being […]
The dust recently settled on another Ponzi scheme. This time the damage was done in Florida, and involved a man who lied to investors about his so-called grocery business. Neil Shapiro was sentenced to twenty years in prison after pleading guilty to securities fraud and money laundering; he was also ordered to pay $82 million […]
