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Our experts frequently write blog posts about the findings of the research we are conducting.

Displaying 41-50 out of 121 results for "Latest Non-Traded REIT Valuations: Not Good".

Enforcement Actions: Week in Review - March 21st, 2014

(Mar 2014)

SEC ENFORCEMENT ACTIONS

Manager of Pre-IPO Investment Funds Settles Fraud Claims
March 20, 2014, (Litigation Release No. 22949)
Frank Mazzola,brokerage firm Felix Investments, LLC, and investment adviserFacie Libre Management, Associates, LLC, have been charged with defrauding "investors in funds created to purchase shares of Facebook, Twitter, and other technology companies prior to their initial public offerings." According to the SEC, Mazzola and Felix Investments "arranged to be...

SEC Litigation Releases: Week in Review - March 7th, 2014

(Mar 2014)

SEC Obtains Summary Judgment Win On Liability Against All Defendants in a Penny Stock Fraud Case
March 5, 2014, (Litigation Release No. 22936)
A summary judgment was entered against StratoComm Corporation, its CEO, Roger D. Shearer, and its former Director of Investor Relations, Craig Danzig, for issuing and distributing "public statements falsely portraying the penny stock company as actively engaged in the manufacture and sale of telecommunications systems for use in underdeveloped...

SEC Litigation Releases: Week in Review - February 7th, 2014

(Feb 2014)

Court of Appeals Denies Stay of Order Compelling Investigative Testimony; Affirms District Court's Exercise of Discretion
February 6, 2014, (Litigation Release No. 22920)
This week the court issued a "summary order denying Edward Daspin's motion for a stay" on a December 2013 order. This means that Daspin is required "to appear for investigative testimony in compliance with an SEC investigative subpoena" and was denied a "request that the SEC be required to pay for Daspin's physician to attend...

SEC Litigation Releases: Week in Review - January 31st, 2014

(Jan 2014)

Court Enters Final Judgment Against Broker in Settlement of Claims Arising from Fraudulent Misrepresentations and the Misappropriation of Funds
January 30, 2014, (Litigation Release No. 22914)
A final judgment was entered this week against David L. Rothman based on charges that "Rothman,...who was the Vice President and minority owner of Rothman Securities, Inc....creat[ed] and issu[ed] false account statements to certain elderly and unsophisticated investor/clients that materially overstated...

SEC Litigation Releases: Week in Review - January 10th, 2014

(Jan 2014)

Securities and Exchange Commission v. Diamond Foods, Inc.
January 9, 2014, (Litigation Release No. 22902)
According to the complaint, Diamond Foods, Inc. manipulated walnut costs to report "higher net income and inflated earnings to exceed analysts' estimates for fiscal quarters in 2010 and 2011." According to the complaint against Diamond's former CFO, Steven Neil, Neil "directed the effort to fraudulently underreport money paid to walnut growers." Diamond's former CEO, Michael Mendes, has...

Merry Christmas from UBS Asset Managers of Puerto Rico

(Dec 2013)

SLCG previously posted two blog entries on the collapse of UBS's Puerto Rico municipal bond funds including the Puerto Rico Fixed Income Funds I to VI and Puerto Rico Investors Tax-Free Funds I to VI. Our October 7, 2013 post, Trouble in Paradise: UBS Puerto Rico Bond Fund Investors Hit Hard, reported on losses in closed end municipal bond funds managed by UBS Asset Managers of Puerto Rico and sold by UBS brokers in Puerto Rico. Then on December 18, 2013 in our Did UBS Charge its Proprietary...

SEC Litigation Releases: Week in Review - December 20th, 2013

(Dec 2013)

SEC Charges Detroit Area Man and His Company with Conducting a Pump and Dump Scheme
December 18, 2013, (Litigation Release No. 22892)
According to the complaint, "Randy A. Hamdan and a related entity, Oracle Consultants LLC,...carr[ied] out a pump-and-dump scheme in the securities of CompuSonics Video Corporation" that resulted in illicit proceeds of almost $30,000. The SEC has charged the defendants with violating the Securities Act and Exchange Act and seeks permanent injunctions,...

Self-Indexing in Commodity-Linked Investments - Citi CUBES

(Dec 2013)

Over the past few weeks and months, we've noticed a pattern in the products coming across our desks: structured investments linked to esoteric proprietary indexes, created by the same bank that issued the product. We touched on this topic a bit when we discussed self-indexing in the context of structured certificates of deposit, but we thought we'd revisit the issue with a few of the examples that we've been looking into more recently. The examples we'll discuss each reference a proprietary...

Did UBS Charge its Proprietary Puerto Rico Bond Funds Excessive Markups?

(Dec 2013)

UBS Puerto Rico's closed-end funds have received much attention in recent months. While the coverage has focused on the funds' leverage and concentration in Puerto Rican municipal bonds (see for example, New York Times and Bloomberg), discovery and further research into the funds is likely to reveal other important issues -excessive markups, for instance.

Investors, including mutual funds like the UBS Puerto Rico Funds, buy municipal bonds from dealers who typically charge a markup over the...

SPIVA Scorecard: Persistent Lack of Persistence

(Dec 2013)

Earlier this week, S&P Dow Jones Indices released their semiannual SPIVA Persistence Scorecard, which assesses how consistent top performingactively managed US equity mutual funds have been. This is the third SPIVA release since our blog has been in existence and each time we bring attention to their work. Once again, their results suggest that mutual fund managers only rarely outperform for long.

This year the study found that roughly 7% of funds that were in the top 25% of actively managed...

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