There are many questions about how Wall Street marketed a very complex product, sold as solid and secure, now emerging in investor arbitration cases. The product is named, incorrectly as it turns out, “100 percent principal protected  notes.” Securities regulators had warned brokerage firms that they should take special care when selling PPN's and other structured products to retail customers […]

WASHINGTON —It was announced July 20, 2011, on FINRA's website that The Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA) has suspended William Bailey, a former NEXT Financial Group, Inc. broker of Mesa, Arizona, from the securities industry for two years for unsuitable and excessive trading of mutual funds and variable annuities. Bailey also engaged in discretionary trading without […]

TALLAHASSEE, Fla. – On The Florida Office of Financial Regulation's website it was announced, July 21, 2011, that The Florida Office of Financial Regulation (OFR) issued a final order on May 26, 2011, against investment adviser James Paul Birmingham (“Birmingham”) (CRD # 222511) and his Broward County companies Birmingham Investments and Birmingham Capital Advisors, LLC for […]

In a June 20, 2011, article from Bloomberg News, it was reported that Massachusetts' top securities regulator is suing RBC Capital Markets LLC and one of its former registered representatives over the sale of leveraged exchange-traded funds, saying they sold them to clients who didn't understand how the investments worked. The Massachusetts Secretary of the […]

In a July, 2011, article by Liz Skinner for InvestmentNews.com, she writes that Wedbush Securities Inc. was ordered to pay a former municipal sales trader Stephen Kelleher $3.5 million for failing to give him years worth of incentive-based compensation he was owed. A three-person Financial Industry Regulatory Authority Inc. (FINRA) panel found the firm's “morally […]

The following article was posted on FINRA's website: WASHINGTON — It was announced that The Securities and Exchange Commission's (SEC) Office of Investor Education and Advocacy and the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA) have issued an investor alert called Structured Notes with Principal Protection: Note the Terms of Your Investment to educate investors about the risks […]

In a July 8, 2011, article by Dan Jamieson for InvestmentNews.com he writes that clients of a prominent Bank of America Merrill Lynch have won an $880,000 arbitration award against the firm. Phil Scott of the firm's Bellevue, Wash., office, was this year ranked No. 30 on the Barron's list of top advisers, with $1.8 […]

Recently, a FINRA arbitration panel made a monetary award  in the case of Stone & Youngberg v. Kay Family Revocable Trust, No. 3:11-cv-00198 (N.D. Cal., 6/22/11),  which was appealed by the defense and lost.    This case involved the challenge by a broker-dealer to a $750,000 award to a former customer, who was advised by Stone & […]

In a June 29, 2011, article by Bruce Kelly for InvestmentNews.com he writes that as part of a settlement with eight states and the Securities and Exchange Commission, Raymond James Financial Inc. will buy back $300 million in auction-rate securities from clients and pay a fine of $1.7 million. The states in charge of the […]