With mounting pressure from regulators, broker/dealers are making changes to how they sell alternative investments. VSR Financial Services Inc., Berthel Fisher & Co. Financial Services Inc. and the Cetera Financial Group Inc., which has four independent-contractor broker-dealers under its umbrella, this year have revised policies or added new guidelines and procedures for the sale of […]

According to a recent article in the New York Times, LPL Financial, has 13,300 brokers, 6,500 offices, 4.3 million customers — and a growing list of problems with regulators. LPL is now the nation’s fourth-largest brokerage firm — after Wells Fargo, Morgan Stanley and Merrill Lynch — and the largest in much of rural America--its […]

In a November 23, 2011, article in FA Magazine, Karen DeMasters writes that LPL Financial has been fined $100,000 for failing to properly oversee one of its brokers in Oregon who sold risky investments to people, many of them elderly and without the mental capacity to make investment decisions. It was reported that the Oregon […]

Soreide Law Group, PLLC, announced that they are currently investigating the sale of the Laeroc Funds, including the Laeroc 2002 Income Fund LP, Laeroc 2004-2005 Income Fund LP, Laeroc 2005-2006 Income Fund LP, Laeroc Edge Fund LP and Laeroc Income Fund 2007, LP. These Laeroc funds were sold as real estate private placements (under Regulation D).  […]