LPL Financial must pay $100K for its improper supervision of a broker. The Oregon Division of Financial and Corporate Securities, which fined the financial firm, reports that LPL Financial has put in place better oversight procedures since the violation was discovered. LPL Financial is a LPL Investment Holdings Inc. division.…
David Kugel, who was a long time Bernard L. Madoff Investment Securities LLC (BMIS), has been charged by the Securities and Exchange Commission with fraud. Kugel is accused of making fake trades to keep Madoff’s multi-billion dollar Ponzi scam running. He has consented to settling the securities fraud charges. The…
A federal court has decided that Oppenheimer municipal bond fund holders can go ahead with their securities fraud complaint against Oppenheimer Funds. The plaintiffs of In re Oppenheimer Rochester Funds Group Securities Litigation are alleging federal securities law violations. Funds involved included: • AMT-Free Municipals Fund • Rochester National Municipals…
The AARP has issued a fraud protection bulletin warning investors how to avoid becoming the victim of whoever happens to be peddling the next Ponzi scheme. Unfortunately, older investors are among the favorite prey of financial fraudsters. According Investor Protection Trusts CEO Don Blandin, one in five people in the…
Two Florida men are accused of defrauding investors and broker-dealers by allegedly not telling them that they didn’t have enough money or securities to pay for their stock trades. The US Justice Department is charging Scott Kupersmith with securities fraud and wire fraud, while the Securities and Exchange Commission is…
The Securities and Exchange Commission says that Annabel McClellan has settled for $1M insider trading allegations that she and her husband gave relatives confidential information about merger deals. Annabel is the wife of Arnold McClellan, who used to be a partner at Deloitte Tax LP where he was head of…
Without denying or admitting to wrongdoing, Banco Espirito Santo S.A. a banking conglomerate based in Portugal, has consented to pay nearly $7M in disgorgement, prejudgment interest, and civil penalties to settle Securities and Exchange Commission allegations that it violated securities transaction, investment adviser, and broker-dealer registration requirements. The bank has…
The Securities and Exchange Commission has filed securities fraud charges against former United Commercial Bank executives accusing them of concealing loss from assets and loans from auditors that resulted in UCBH Holdings Inc., its public holding company, to understate its operating losses in 2008 by at least $65 million. As…
The Securities and Exchange Commission is suing investment adviser Kurt Hovan for allegedly misappropriating $178K in “soft dollars” that he claimed was used for investment research. The federal agency contends that, in fact, the money was used to cover other business-related expenses. When Kurt, as Hovan Capital Management president, was…
Sandra Venetis, a New Jersey investment adviser has been sentenced to 168 months behind bars. Venetis had entered guilty pleas to che charges of securities fraud and transacting in criminal property. She also must pay $11,579,781 in restitution to the investors she defrauded. The government had accused Venetis, who owns…