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Watch ‘American Greed’ March 10th

March 8, 2010 (By Bud Burrell)

2 Hours on Short Seller, Anthony Elgindy

– From “Front and Center”, by C. Austin Burrell –

I was informed this evening that the CNBC Series “American Greed” will air a 2 hour special on the notorious short seller and convicted felon Amir “Anthony” Elgindy. Elgindy was the operator of the most notorious criminal short selling syndicate of the last decade, known by several names, including “Anthony@Pacific”, etc. After being arrested in early 2002, and being released on bail, Elgindy was caught trying to fly from New York’s Islip Airport back to San Diego, in possession of $40,000 in cash, and more in precious jewelry, along with phony passports with different names on them from his own.

While Elgindy was operating, he attacked thousands of companies, 2200 plus, with impunity and aggressive arrogance. Working with lawyers specializing in suits for Directors and Officers liability insurance, paid bashers, pay for play journalists, NASD (now FINRA) boiler room broker-dealers, PIPES financiers, bloggers and hedge funds short sellers to destroy and preferably bankrupt his target companies. [entire post]

Tags: 2200 companies victimized, american greed, anthony@pacific, bail, bankruptcy, d&o insurance suits, deregistration, doj, elgindy, finra, mad max, milberg weiss, nasd, paid bashers, pipes financiers, prison, sec, short selling syndicate, silicon investor, web site
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Whistleblower On Madoff Rocks Mainstream Media

March 4, 2010 (By Bud Burrell)

Harry Markopolos’ Book: “No One Would Listen”

– From “Front and Center”, by C. Austin Burrell –

This week, Certified Fraud Examiner Harry Markopolos announced the release of his new book, “No One Would Listen”, about the complete stonewall he hit with US Government Regulators including the SEC and FINRA. He told his story in his typical low key and very professional manner, making his message all the more devastating.

I am sure that SEC, FINRA and other officials to whom he reported his findings on the scope of the Madoff fraud felt footfalls on their graves.

Starting with CNBC, and then going to Matt Lauer, CNN and FOX News, he recounted his story of his discovery of the Madoff fraud, which had been ongoing for many years, when he examined the claimed performance of Madoff’s split strike price conversion strategy, and his quick realization that he claimed performance that would have simply been impossible to produce. He recited the sequence of events that led him to conclude within 30 minutes that Madoff was a fraud. It is where it went from there that no one except people who had faced similar risks could imagine. [entire post]

Tags: book, conversions, finra, harry markopolos, lawyer misconduct, madoff, no one would listen, reverse conversions, sec, short selling, split strike price, threats
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Predator Pay-For-Play Journalists And Their Ilk: Who Pays And Who Benefits?

January 26, 2010 (By Bud Burrell)

– From “Front and Center”, by C. Austin Burrell –

I have watched the conduct of a figurative nest of journalists/bloggers/bashers/critics in a series of attacks on the targets of short raids many times over the past 15 years. The questions that never seem to be answered are the most basic? How do these parties pay their bills? Who is paid or not paid to the benefit of what organization, entity, or agency? If you think so many man hours could be devoted completely pro bono to analysis of mostly small companies balance sheets and management, I encourage you to look deeper.

I have watched the unrelenting attacks against companies who have dared to challenge these self-described vermin in the Courts. Without exception, the same attackers’ names appear repeatedly in such a consistent pattern that it cannot be a random occurrence. I have seen the work of internet sleuths tracking the patterns of relationships between these journalists and notorious market manipulators, including everyone from major hedge funds, to a community of professional journalists, unpaid web site and message board bloggers, compensated bashers, criminal rigged research organizations, and eventually to the federal agencies we depend on for oversight of our markets and the manipulators to regularly savage our assets.

The question “Quo Bene?” is older than our society. Thousands of years ago, corruption was cited that was tracked back to its sources by the simple method of looking first at who benefitted from the acts of corruption. This was true from Egypt, to Greece, to Rome, to modern times. The “contracts” between these parties track to not only involved cash considerations, but also to professional support, school access for related parties, legal partnerships, and more. Predation consumes assets as its cost of doing business, and those assets must come from some source.

Why haven’t those in charge asked these questions? Indeed, the SEC and FINRA have protected their related external supporting parties to this predation from any fair, open and balanced inquiry hundreds of times over the past decade. Why is this so? [entire post]

Tags: $14 trillion gdp, $15 trillion gnp, bashers, egypt, finra, greece, journalists, legal roles, liabilities $105 Trillion, lies, market manipulators, pay-for-play, perptrators, predators, research for pay, rico, rome, sec, selling shovels
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SEC, FINRA, Madoff, Stanford: Painful & Offensive Evid

October 15, 2009 (By Bud Burrell)

From “Front and Center”, by Bud Burrell

– This week, an 80 page internal report of the behavior of Dallas and New York FINRA staff members in actively protecting and shielding Sir Allen Stanford and his billion dollar Ponzi scheme was leaked by unidentified sources. This sickening report drove home the total absence of internal controls at FINRA related to discovering and acting on massive frauds for which they were given nearly untold numbers of signals that should have prompted their action against such parties. Near the end of the report, it was stated that the behavior of FINRA was essentially identical with regard to Bernie Madoff’s Registered Investment Advisor and his related broker-dealer.

Some years ago, I had the chance to see a brilliant and upcoming 18 year old comedian at “Catch a Rising Star”. He wrecked the audience with the description of his multi-ethnic background, saying his mother and father, who were from different ethnic groups, had met each other on the subway picking each others’ pockets.

After hearing the full stories of the way in which Madoff and Stanford each manipulated the SEC and FINRA to a point of abuse, I was reminded of this routine. The only difference was that in this case we had two RICO criminal enterprises manipulating two other Government and quasi-governmental institutional criminal enterprises, working together to pick the pockets of major investors, domestically and internationally. [entire post]

Tags: atm, cojones, einstein, finra, fraud, impeachment, madoff, petitions, picking pockets, recalls, sec, stanford, stupidity
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Why Has The SEC Facilitated Systematic Terrorist Money Laundering?

June 30, 2009 (By Bud Burrell)

From “Front & Center”, by Bud Burrell

Yesterday, in scanning terrorism sites, I found a link to The Terror Finance Blog, and bells went off. Searching back, I found that they had referenced the twice convicted felon Amir Elgindy as a primary example of such market related actions. I then remembered that the DOJ had indicated that they expected to file as many as 35 to 40 additional indictments in this case, which involved bribery of FBI agents, which is normally a very hot button with the DOJ. Typically, not a single superceding indictment was forthcoming.

The DOJ could not have made this case without finding that the SEC was in it up to their collective duffs. Despite this, not one SEC official was indicted, despite plentiful evidence of their collusion with Elgindy, attorneys Weiss and Lerach, and many more. Hard evidence was the foundation of the conviction of Elgindy, in the form of clean transcripts of the actual web site he ran in support of his shorting syndicate. This site demonstrated the involvement of many of the major hedge fund operators, market makers, and more.

The most repeated and glaring reference I have made with regard to illegal naked short selling has been to its role as a tactical tool to launder money and evade taxes, moving money offshore for various terrorist enterprises, including organized crime, terrorists and narco-terrorists, domestic and international. I have proved this over and over again, in case after case, only to be met by a black hole of silence from our authorities. I have shown them link after link to name after name, all of them repeatedly involved with one another is hundreds of transactions. The silence of the response has been deafening. [entire post]

Tags: doj, enron, fbi, finra, gao, jim cramer, no superceding indictments, perp walk, sec, special purpose entities, terrorism, terrorist money laundering
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Madoff Losses Ratcheted Up To $65 Billion, Is Anyone Surprised?

June 20, 2009 (By Bud Burrell)

From “Front & Center”, by Bud Burrell

I predicted that the original estimates of $50 Billion would be upped as investigators got into the Madoff accounts. Yesterday, they announced that the amount of the losses was increased to $65 Billion, and I would bet the number goes higher before this is over.

The question becomes why wasn’t the number accurate to start with? Monday, following the 60 Minutes Redux piece covering Harry Markopolos’ ground breaking work on Madoff, the SEC IG went into take a 3 hour statement from Madoff, presumably on who at the SEC rejected his original findings presented no fewer than 5 times formally, and how they could justify ignoring his analytical work.

I would bet that the SEC IG will again find specific failures on the part of the SEC staff, which findings they will reject as being without foundation. The SEC IG is clearly unarmed for this battle, and he needs to bring in the DOJ and the FBI. If that doesn’t happen, the SEC must be broken up, along with its close associate, FINRA. [entire post]

Tags: $65 billion, 60 minutes, amorality, counterfeiting, finra, losses up, madoff, madoff exemption, markopolos, sec ig, sec staff, sociopathy, tina turner
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The US Economy And Stimulus Policies: A Target-Rich Environment

June 11, 2009 (By Bud Burrell)

From “Front & Center”, by Bud Burrell

Some months ago, I predicted that logic would dictate a market bounce triggered by the inflationary impact of historic stimulus spending in all forms. I also said it would have to carry not only the stock market up, but commodities too.

That is precisely what has happened. The Dow is up some 2000 points off the bottom, and the S&P is up to the range of 950. Oil, after making a low of $34 has now doubled to over $70 per barrel. Commodity prices are soaring, even as the dollar index is trading at 80. Every key signal of pending inflation of an historic character is now on the table. The best minds I work with are most concerned about the monstrous impact on things that are used to produce products, ship products, grow foods, deliver foods, and more, across all relevant spectrums most directly affecting the lower and middle classes. [entire post]

Tags: change, cia, commodities, cost(s), crises, dollar, dow, excuses, fbi, fda, finra, inflation, oil, prices, rico, s&p, sec, stimulus
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Regulatory Reform In The Obama Era

April 22, 2009 (By Peter Chepucavage)

From “Plexus Nexus”, by Peter Chepucavage

(Co-authored by Tony Broy) — Senator Jack Reed, a Democrat and Chairman of the Senate Subcommittee on securities said last Thursday he will hold a hearing to review the Securities and Exchange Commission from top to bottom and see where improvements can be made and would call in experts to offer recommendations. While there may well be benefits to this effort, it will also slow down any internal efforts by the commission to restructure. We offer the following as a temporary solution that can be implemented without legislation.

REGULATION BY ENFORCEMENT IS NOT WISE

Expectations are high for serious reform and much of that expectation suggests more SEC enforcement staff. But as explained in the Center for Capital Markets Competitiveness Report on the Efficiency and Effectiveness of the SEC, http://www.uschamber.com/assets/ccmc/090211ccmc_sec_speed.pdf (CCM REPORT) enforcement should not be the primary venue for implementing policy. The SEC must not always be reactive. We believe there is much confusion about the role of such staff. By its very nature enforcement staff pursue sanctions after the fact. The former Enforcement Director admitted as much at the congressional hearing. They do not perform surveillance or examine. A wiser approach or strategy might be how to prevent problems through an increase in preventative staff or better use of current resources. Harry Markopolis-HM- made the same point in his testimony at the Congressional hearing.

ALLOCATION OF RESOURCES IS VITAL

There are currently at least 6 entities regulating the securities side of financial services. The SEC has 3500 employees. FINRA has 3000 employees. The NYSE regulatory staff has approximately 300-500 employees and the NASDAQ regulatory staff has additional personnel. The 50 states have approximately 500-700 employees in their securities administrator’s offices and attorney general’s offices. [entire post]

Tags: broker-dealer(s), ccm report, compliance, congress, democrat, derivative(s), enforcement, finra, fund, gao, jack reed, legislation, nyse, ocie, otc, oversight, regulation(s), sanction(s), sec, securities, senate, sifma, subcommittee, the fed, violation, wall street, whistle blower
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FINRA Rules Relating To Research, Rumors, Frontrunning And The Fiduciary Duty Debate

March 30, 2009 (By Peter Chepucavage)

From “Plexus Nexus”, by Peter Chepucavage

One of the major issues in the current debate over financial reform is whether investment advisors should be required to join an SRO. A fundamental aspect of the debate is their fiduciary duty as compared to a broker’s suitability responsibility. An additional issue is whether hedge funds should register as IA’S. Contemporaneously with the debate, FINRA has proposed numerous rules regarding the duties of brokers. Furthermore hedge fund litigation continues over trading ahead of research reports and/or pending orders. The following is an attempt to tie these rules together in the current context of the debate over hedge fund regulation and fiduciary duties.

There has long been uncertainty over the bds’ use of pending research reports and orders. Ad hoc attempts to clarify these issues over the years have lead to additional questions. These pronouncements seem designed to provide needed guidance albeit in a fragmented fashion. But they may also be an attempt to get ahead of their fiduciary controversy. Essentially they say neither you nor your clients can trade ahead of research or pending orders. But you can provide the research to your clients before it becomes public but not to selective clients. [entire post]

Tags: finra, front-running, research
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