Investor Lawyers Blog

Securities News: Tax Reporting Mistake Costs Morgan Stanley $70M, SEC Accuses Trading Firm & Broker-Dealer of Manipulation, Layering Schemes, and RD Legal Capital’s Hedge Fund is Accused of Targeting Injured NFL Players & 9/11 Responders

Published on: March 9, 2017 | by Shepherd Smith Edwards & Kantas, LLP

Morgan Stanley Ordered to Pay $70M for Tax-Reporting Errors
In its yearly regulatory filing, Morgan Stanley (MS) announced that it took a $70M charge because of tax-reporting mistakes made by its brokerage business from ’11 to ’16. The firm is talking to the Internal Revenue Service to settle any client tax underpayments. Morgan Stanley said that some of its wealth management clients that may have overpaid taxes as a result of these errors and they would be paid back.

The firm also announced that it might sustain a $221.3M loss because of a lawsuit brought by Salzburg, the Austrian state, over commodities derivatives and fixed-income transactions between ’05 and ’12. Salzburg claims that Morgan Stanley did not having the authority or ability to make such deals—a contention that the latter disputes.

Trading Firm Accused of Manipulating US Markets
According to a complaint brought by the US Securities and Exchange Commission, Avalon FA manipulated the US markets on hundreds of thousands of occasions, allegedly making over $21M in a layering scam. The regulator obtained an asset freeze against the Ukrainian trading company.

Texas Securities Fraud: San Angeleno Man Goes to Prison over $900K Investment Scam, Jury Convicts Houston Couple For Bilking California Bank, and Dallas Twins Go to Jail Over Ponzi Scam

Published on: March 8, 2017 | by Shepherd Smith Edwards & Kantas, LLP

San Angeleno Man Goes to Prison Over Investment Scams
Stanley Jonathan Fortenberry of Texas has been sentenced to 78 months behind bars for running two investment scams and bilking investors of about $900K. He pleaded guilty to obstruction of justice and mail fraud in 2016. Now, Fortenberry must pay over $890K in restitution and forfeit more than $311K.

Fortenberry ran Premier Investment Fund and raised money for social media projects operated by another company. According to prosecutors, the Texas man misled investors about that company’s profitability and regarding what their money would be used for. He admitted to diverting about half of investors’ money to himself and to his fundraising operation.

Fortenberry also ran Wattenberg Energy Partners, a company that raised money for oil and glass drilling projects in Colorado. He admitted to establishing the company under his son’s name because the US Securities and Exchange Commission was already investigating him about the way Premier investors’ funds were being used.

Defendants Convicted of Ponzi Scam That Touted Loans to Professional Athletes Are Sentenced to Prison

Published on: March 6, 2017 | by Shepherd Smith Edwards & Kantas, LLP

Susan C. Daub and William D. Allen have each been sentenced to six years in prison for running a Ponzi scam that involved issuing loans to professional athletes. Allen, a former NFL player with the Miami Dolphins and the New England Patriots, and Daub have been both the subject of a criminal case and an Securities and Exchange Commission case over this matter.

The two of them were arrested in 2015 on criminal charges of wire fraud, conspiracy, and charging money related to a specified illegal act. Along with their Capital Financial Partners Enterprises, Capital Financial Holdings, and Capital Financial Partners, the two of them raised nearly $32M from investors, who were told that they were providing loans professional athletes but would get back their money in full along with interest when the loans were repaid.

In its civil case, SEC said that Daub and Allen only advanced about $18M to the athletes even though they’d raised over $31M from investors. The regulator said that from 7/2012 through 2/2015, even though the defendants had only gotten back a little over $13M in loan repayments from the pro athletes, they paid back about $20M to investors by using investors’ funds to make up for the almost $7M deficit.

Hedge Funds Pursing More than $3B From PriceWaterhousCoopers in MF Global Lawsuit

Published on: March 5, 2017 | by Shepherd Smith Edwards & Kantas, LLP

The trial in which a number of hedge funds and creditors are partly blaming PricewaterhouseCoopers for the collapse of MF Global is about to begin in U.S. District Court in New York. The plaintiffs, alleging malpractice involving “erroneous accounting advice,” are seeking over $3B in damages. Former MF Global CEO Jon Corzine, also an Ex-Goldman Sachs (GS) co-chairman and formerly both a New Jersey governor and US senator, is expected to testify in court.

MF Global, once a global financial derivatives broker, is no longer in business. The firm failed in 2011 after customers left when they learned that Corzine had placed big bets on European sovereign debt during a volatile time for the markets. This caused a $1.6B shortfall in client accounts.

Yet, because MF Global employed repo-to-maturity instruments to bet on the debt, this let the firm report the bets as gains, which enhanced the way its revenue looked. Also, clients’ funds were commingled with MF Global’s funds even though they should not have been mixed together.

Dallas, TX Man Pleads Guilty in $131M Broker Fraud Case

Published on: February 28, 2017 | by Shepherd Smith Edwards & Kantas, LLP

Herschel “Tress” Knippa III, a Dallas, Texas resident, has pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit securities fraud. The former registered broker, who owned a commodities trading firm, was implicated over fraudulent market rigging involving ForceField Energy Inc. (FNRG), which was a supposed global distributor and provider of LED lighting products and solutions. Investors lost $131M because of the scam.

According to court filings and facts submitted at the plea hearing, between 1/2009 and 4/2015, Knippa and others worked together to bilk those who invested in ForceField. The conspirators artificially manipulated the price and volume of ForceField shares by 1) using nominees to buy and sell the stock but without disclosing this to investors and potential investors, 2) manipulating ForceField stock trading to make it seem as if there was real interest and genuine trading volume, and 3) hiding payments made to brokerage firms and stock promoters that marketed and sold the stock.

All the while, Knippa and others claimed that ForceField was an independent company. Also, they used disposable prepaid cell phones, encrypted message applications to communicate, and paid kickbacks in cash.

SEC Charges Chinese Citizens Over Alleged $29M Insider Trading Tied to Comcast-DreamWorks Acquisition

Published on: February 28, 2017 | by Shepherd Smith Edwards & Kantas, LLP

The US Securities and Exchange Commission is charging the partner of a Hong Kong-based private equity firm with securities fraud. The regulator claims that Shaohua (Michael) Yin of Summitview Capital Management Ltd. obtained over $56M of DreamWorks Animation SKG stock by using the US brokerage accounts of five Chinese nationals, including his parents.

When DreamWork’s stock price went up 47.3% after news that Comcast was acquiring it went public, the five accounts made $29M from the DreamWorks trades.

The SEC claims that Yin tried to conceal that he was in charge of the five accounts, which had addresses in Palo Alto and Beijing, but the regulator was still able to identify him as the one behind the suspect trading. Prior to becoming a partner at Summitview Capital, Yin worked for UBS (UBS) and private equity firm Warburg Pincus Asia LLC.

Elder Financial Fraud: Ex-K.C. Ward Financial Rep. Barred Over $15M in Unsuitable Investments

Published on: February 27, 2017 | by Shepherd Smith Edwards & Kantas, LLP

FINRA Bars Registered Rep For $15M In Unauthorized Trades

The Financial Industry Regulatory Authority has barred Craig David Dima, a former registered representative with KC Ward Financial, for making about $15M in unsuitable and unauthorized trades in the account of a 73-year-old retiree. According to the self-regulatory organization, there were 11 times when Dima sold nearly all of the customer’s stock in Colgate-Palmolive that she’d accrued from working with the company for nearly thirty years and he did that without permission.

After the elderly client told Dima not to sell the stock, he proceeded to sell them anyways. When the customer confronted Dima, he purportedly misrepresented that a computer or technical mistake had caused the sale. Meantime, the client was “deprived” of the “substantial dividends” from the Colgate shares she used to own. Dima charged the customer over $375K in fees, mark-downs, and mark-ups.

By settling, Dima is not denying or admitting to FINRA’s charges of elder financial fraud.

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Oceanografía Sues Citigroup, Claims Alleged Multi-Million Dollar Fraud at Banamex

Published on: February 27, 2017 | by Shepherd Smith Edwards & Kantas, LLP

Oceanografía, formerly the biggest oil and gas company in Latin America, is accusing Citigroup (C) of using it to detract from probes into the fraud involving Banamex, which is Citibank’s Mexican subsidiary. Oceanografía collapsed in 2014.

Citigroup is accused of granting a $585M credit line to Oceanografía so that the latter could get hundreds of millions of dollars in cash advances for work by Pemex, an oil company owned by Mexico. However in February 2014, Pemex notified Citigroup that about $400M in Oceanografía invoices, which were supposed to secure the cash advances, had been forged, possibly by a Banamex employee. Because of this, Citibank cancelled Oceanografía’s credit line and the oil and gas company collapsed.

Oceanografía maintains that it never forged the invoices nor did it have cause for such illegal action.

Criminal Securities Fraud: Ex- CEO Extradited From Namibia is Sentenced to 30-Months, Long Island “Mini Madoff’s Associate Goes to Prison Over $400M Scheme, and the Trial of Two Ex-Barclays Traders is Underway in the UK

Published on: February 26, 2017 | by Shepherd Smith Edwards & Kantas, LLP

Libor Trial Of Two-Ex Barclays Traders Begins
Ryan Reich and Stylianos Contogoulas are on trial in London on criminal charges accusing them of rigging the US dollar Libor. According to prosecutors, from ’05-’07, the two ex-Barclays Plc (BARC) traders conspired to manipulate the interest-rate benchmark in order to profit illegally.

Contogoulas and Reich have pleaded not guilty to the criminal charges. Two other ex-Barclays employees, Jonathan Mathew and Peter Johnson, were previously convicted for rigging Libor. They were tasked with submitting Libor rates.

16 banks are responsible for determining the Libor dollar rate every day. They do this by estimating how much it would cost to borrow from one another over different periods. The Libor dollar rate is linked to mortgages and loans and other financial products. Already, a number of big banks have collectively paid several billion dollars for their role in Libor manipulation.

Securities Cases: Broidy Wealth Management Advisors Founder Pleads Guilty to Fraud, Bondholders File Arbitration Claim Against BOK Financial, and SEC Files Complaint in $5M Pyramid Scam

Published on: February 26, 2017 | by Shepherd Smith Edwards & Kantas, LLP

RIA Misappropriated Over $865K and Withdrew $640K in Excess Fees, Say Prosecutors
Broidy Wealth Advisors CEO Mark Broidy has pleaded guilty to taking $640K in excess management fees from clients and misappropriating over $864K in stock that were in trusts of which he was the trustee. Now, the registered investment advisor must make restitutions to those whom he defrauded. He could end up serving up to five years behind barsamong other penalties.

According to the Justice Department, from around 11/2010 to 7/2016 Broidy billed more than what he was allowed to in compensation, which caused three clients to pay more than $640K in excess fees. He concealed his theft by falsifying those clients’ IRS Form 1099s.

After one client demanded that Broidy pay back the stolen funds the latter allegedly sold over $865K of stock from another client’s trust accounts, which were for that person’s children. Broidy also suggested that several clients invest in startups with which he had deals to pay him part of any money he raised on the companies’ behalf. The clients didn’t know about these arrangements.