FINRA members love to sell private placements for one reason: they pay huge commissions, far bigger commissions than stocks, bonds, or mutual funds.
Do you know what happens to rogue brokers once they are barred from the securities industry? One would assume that they would be left to find a new career, and more or less, start over. But this is not the case. Barred brokers often find a way to stay in the industry; making it unsafe for [...]
For the first time, a federal grand jury has indicted a stockbroker – David McFadden, formerly of Securities America, Inc. - for allegedly conspiring to defraud elderly investors. Jessica Papini of the Wall Street Journal has covered the story. Her latest piece in the WSJ reads in part as follows:
“This is a very unusual case,” said Joseph Fogel of [...]
The Super Bowl was in Tampa this year. If you had let the Cardinals decide where the game should be played, they’d have played it in Phoenix. If the Steelers had been allowed to decide, we’d have watched them play football in snowy Pittsburgh. Why? Home field advantage. Every team wants it. Though you’ll see [...]
Mara Der Hovanesian has written a story that all baby boomers should read. In this week’s BusinessWeek, Hovanesian covers the story that Investor’s Watchblog has been following since our launch and that too few reporters cover. There is a tidal wave of investment fraud breaking over American baby boomers. Their nest eggs are disappearing not [...]
Like attorneys, doctors, and accountants, stockbrokers are required to take continuing education courses. For stockbrokers, the course comes in two parts–a regulatory part and a firm part. The firm part is an on-line course followed by an on-line test that the brokers can take from their own computers. They receive a user name and password [...]
The Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA) has disciplined five broker-dealers for “mutual fund sales and supervisory violations.” The firms all failed to give mutual fund customers commission discounts to which they were entitled. The five firms are Prudential Securities, Inc., Pruco Securities, Inc., UBS Financial Services, Merrill Lynch, and Wells Fargo.
She trusted him. He’d been her broker for more than 20 years. When her husband died in 1999 and she wanted to set up a charitable foundation to benefit the arts, she made the broker an officer and trustee of the foundation. In 2000, when she entered a nursing home in failing health, she gave the broker [...]
As the U.S. economy tumbles and the world economy trembles, businesses will begin laying off workers. In October, AOL announced that it would be laying off 2000 employees. Yahoo is planning on laying off hundreds of employees. Airbus is set to cut 10,000 jobs.
SEC Shuts Down Alleged Ponzi Scheme Preying on Seniors
The Securities and Exchange Commission has shut down an apparent Ponzi scheme that includes so many of the red flags for fraud that it could serve as the basis for an entire course on investor protection.