In a report from the United States Securities and Exchange Commission's website, it was announced on August 10, 2011, the SEC charged Stifel, Nicolaus & Co., Inc., a St. Louis-based broker-dealer, and former Stifel Senior Vice President David W. Noack with defrauding five Wisconsin school districts by selling them unsuitably risky and complex investments funded largely […]

 Josh Funk, a business writer for the AP wrote that  TD Ameritrade has agreed to a $10 million settlement for failing to properly supervise representatives who misled investors about the safety of a money-market mutual fund that "broke the buck" in 2008, the Securities and Exchange Commission said. Funk writes that TD Ameritrade Holding Corp. customers who still hold […]

In an InvestmentNews.com article, Darla Mercado writes that two registered representatives with Planmember Securities Corp. could lose their securities licenses in Texas and face fines of $100,000 each for the improper sale of life settlement notes. The brokers, Jimmy Wayne Freeman Jr. and Kris Bradford Rhoden, were due to appear at the State Office of Administrative […]

It was reported that on July 22, 2011, the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) released a report from its Life Settlements Task Force which recommended that the SEC urge Congress to amend the federal securities laws to include life settlements as securities. The SEC report also recommended that the SEC monitor brokers and providers to assure […]

Darla Mercado of InvestmentNews.com, recently wrote that Finra's variable annuity (VA) suitability rule should be old news to broker-dealers, but firms that want to avoid an arbitration land mine ought to review their procedures. Mercado writes this warning came directly from Andrew A. Favret, associate vice president and regional chief counsel at the Financial Industry Regulatory […]

Back in April of 2007, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission sued a hedge fund, Lydia Capital LLC (Lydia), in the U.S. District Court for Massachusetts alleging fraud against investors in life insurance policies purchased by Lydia. SEC v. Lydia Capital LLC, No. 1:07-CV-10712, (D. Mass. Apr. 12, 2007). granting in part a motion by the SEC, […]

There have been claims filed with the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA) against the NNN Capital Opportunity Fund, LLC, in connection with the sale of defective financial products. Subject to review it appears to have retained its value well during the financial crisis, then imploded thereafter. Many of these products are manufactured for retail sale to the investment public with […]

In an article from InvestmentNews.com, on July 25, 2011, Dan Jamieson writes that FINRA has warned investors about chasing yield with structured products, junk bonds and floating-rate bank-loan funds. The Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA) issued an investor alert about the risks found in these and other products. The alert was prompted by "significant recent inflows" […]