Month: February 2019

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Article: COLUMBIA SPORTSWEAR SUES RIVAL OVER FRAUD, RACKETEERING

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COLUMBIA SPORTSWEAR SUES RIVAL OVER FRAUD, RACKETEERING

Oregon Small Business Association, 27 February 2019

Portland-based Columbia Sportswear has filed a $20 million lawsuit against a competitor, accusing Seirus Innovative Accessories of San Diego and its leaders of wire fraud, perjury, and racketeering.

Columbia’s lawsuit, filed in U.S. District Court in Portland, is just the latest volley in six-year intellectual property fight rife with accusations of perjury, fraud, and destruction of evidence.

Columbia accused Seirus of violating its two patents by copying its heat-reflective Omni-Heat technology, according to The Oregonian. Columbia uses the profitable technology introduced in 2010 in its clothing, including shirts, gloves, socks and jackets. Seirus uses a similar reflective fabric in its products.
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Article: Short-seller Andrew Left to appeal against Hong Kong market ban

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Short-seller Andrew Left to appeal against Hong Kong market ban

Reuters, 26 February 2019

HONG KONG (Reuters) – U.S. short seller Andrew Left lost his legal bid on Tuesday to overturn a five-year ban from Hong Kong’s financial markets and a fine for market manipulation.

Left, founder of U.S.-based short-seller Citron Research, was banned in 2016 after he was found culpable of market misconduct in connection with the publication of a research report on Chinese property developer China Evergrande Group.

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Article: Solidus Raises $3 Million in Seed Financing to Tackle Digital Asset Market Manipulation

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Solidus Raises $3 Million in Seed Financing to Tackle Digital Asset Market Manipulation

Business Wire, 25 February 2019

Solidus Labs, provider of a machine learning-powered trade surveillance platform tailored for digital assets, secured a $3 million seed round of financing led by Hanaco Ventures. Additional participants in the round include Global Founders Capital, as well as angel investors and Wall Street veterans David Krell and Norman Sorensen. With the proceeds Solidus’ team of former Goldman Sachs engineers is set to address a major challenge preventing greater institutional and mainstream adoption of digital assets – trade manipulation and market integrity.

Solidus’ web-based platform is already deployed with diverse clients including exchanges, broker-dealers, hedge funds and market makers in Europe, the United States and Israel. The funding round will be used to continue expanding the company’s engineering and machine learning teams, as well as sales, marketing and customer success operations. Solidus is accommodating growing demand from digital asset firms, as those strive to satisfy intensifying regulatory oversight and high compliance standards of traditional financial institutions. Continue reading “Article: Solidus Raises $3 Million in Seed Financing to Tackle Digital Asset Market Manipulation”

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Suspended: CSSC Brokerage Services, Inc. Suspended by FINRA

Suspended

CSSC Brokerage Services, Inc. Suspended by FINRA

19 February 2019

An Office of Hearing Officers (OHO) decision became final in which the firm was fined $120,000, suspended from participating in private securities offerings in all capacities for one year and ordered to pay $130,000, plus interest, jointly and severally, in restitution to customers. The sanctions were based on findings that the firm willfully violated Section 10(b) of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, Rule 10b-5 thereunder, and violated FINRA Rule 2020 by defrauding investors by offering and selling securities through a bridge loan offering designed to keep its floundering parent company afloat after more than three years of failed deals, significant business losses and mounting debts that the parent company could not pay.

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Article: Forced End of “Ponzi-Like Leverage” & “Fraudulent Lending” Turns Australia’s House Price Bubble into “Property Bloodbath”

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Forced End of “Ponzi-Like Leverage” & “Fraudulent Lending” Turns Australia’s House Price Bubble into “Property Bloodbath”

Wolf Richter, 19 February 2019

As investors are fleeing Australia’s housing bust, sales of new houses have plunged to record lows, and home prices in the Sydney and Melbourne metros have dropped 12% and 9% from their respective peaks in mid and late 2017. Combined, the two metros account for about two-thirds of residential property value in Australia. A two-decade-long housing boom, interrupted by only a few minor dips, led to two of the most magnificent housing bubbles in the world, and they’re not “plateauing” or anything. Continue reading “Article: Forced End of “Ponzi-Like Leverage” & “Fraudulent Lending” Turns Australia’s House Price Bubble into “Property Bloodbath””

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Article: Germany bans Wirecard ‘shorting’ as prosecutors probe FT journalist

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Germany bans Wirecard ‘shorting’ as prosecutors probe FT journalist

Arno Schuetze

Reuters, 18 February 2019

FRANKFURT (Reuters) – Germany’s financial watchdog has banned “short” selling of Wirecard shares due to volatility in the payments firm’s stock following reports in the Financial Times which are now the subject of an investigation by German authorities.

Munich prosecutors said on Monday they were investigating a Financial Times journalist, confirming that they had widened a probe into a possible violation of securities trading rules.

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Article: Top US investor in charge of £3bn Russian hedge fund jailed over alleged £29m fraud

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Top US investor in charge of £3bn Russian hedge fund jailed over alleged £29m fraud

Oliver Carroll, 16 February 2019

A Russian court has sentenced a prominent American investor to two months of pre-trial detention in a development that has sent shockwaves through the country’s business community.

Michael Calvey, the founder of Baring Vostok Capital Partners, was one of several executives arrested on Friday.

He is one of the last major western private equity investors to remain in Russia, with his investment company claiming to have raised nearly $4bn (£3.1bn) in capital.

On Friday, a judge ordered Mr Calvey be detained for 72 hours, but agreed to a longer restriction less than a day later. Continue reading “Article: Top US investor in charge of £3bn Russian hedge fund jailed over alleged £29m fraud”

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Fined: Cantone Research Inc. Fined by FINRA

Fined

Cantone Research Inc. Fined by FINRA

14 February 2019

The firm, Anthony Cantone and Christine Cantone appealed a National Adjudicatory Council (NAC) decision to the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The firm was fined $150,000, jointly and severally, with Anthony Cantone and fined $73,000, jointly and severally, with Christine Cantone. Anthony Cantone was suspended from association with any FINRA member in all capacities for 15 months. Christine Cantone was suspended from association with any FINRA member in any principal and supervisory capacity for two years and required to requalify by examination as a securities principal upon completion of her suspension.

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Article: What happened to Namaste Technologies (TSXV: N)

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What happened to Namaste Technologies (TSXV: N)

Ted Ohashi, 13 February 2019

QUESTION: What’s happening with Namaste Technologies (TSXV: N). I know it was one of your top recommendations a few years ago and then you cooled on it. Now I read the founder and CEO is fired by the Board and his uncle the Chairman is selling stock.

ANSWER: There’s no joy in kicking someone when they are down so that is not my objective. I often talk about the importance of management in the investment decision making process and Namaste Technologies (TSXV: N) is an excellent case in point. But the point of it is although reports by those much abhorred short sellers who write hatchet jobs on companies that describe in graphic terms why they believe a stock is extremely overvalued. But time and time again, they do provide a valuable service.
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Fined: Kestra Investment Services, LLC fka NFP Advisor Services, LLC Fined by FINRA

Fined

Kestra Investment Services, LLC fka NFP Advisor Services, LLC Fined by FINRA

13 February 2019

A Letter of Acceptance, Waiver and Consent (AWC) was issued in which the firm was censured, fined $225,000 and required to provide FINRA with a plan to remediate eligible customers who qualified for, but did not receive, the applicable mutual fund sales-charge waiver or appropriate share class. As part of this settlement, the firm agrees to pay restitution to eligible customers, which is estimated to total $1,947,704 (i.e. the amount eligible customers were overcharged, inclusive of interest).

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Article: Overstock founder Patrick Byrne pitches radical transformation of government services via blockchain

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Overstock founder Patrick Byrne pitches radical transformation of government services via blockchain

Aaron Hankin, 12 February 2019

Even Venezuela can easily be fixed, Byrne claims: ‘We could step into Venezuela with six laptops and create not only a functioning society but arguably one with the most advanced government systems in the world’ Continue reading “Article: Overstock founder Patrick Byrne pitches radical transformation of government services via blockchain”

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Article: Fraud allegations put Wirecard’s shy billionaire CEO Markus Braun in the spotlight

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Fraud allegations put Wirecard’s shy billionaire CEO Markus Braun in the spotlight

Straits Times (Singapore), 7 February 2019

The 49-year-old Austrian computer scientist has spent more than a decade fighting off critics whose whispering campaign burst into the headlines again last week. A Financial Times report of suspect transactions in Asia sent the company’s shares plummeting.

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Comment: WireCard appears to be under attack by naked short sellers aided by corrupt journalists who, if properly iinvestigated, would in all likehood be found to have received substantial financial incentives for trashing the company. Dan McCrum at Financial Times is the “journalist” under investigation by German authorities. The bad guys most times have a [hired] whistleblower that alerts police and regulatory authorities. Once they have information sometimes legit, other times not or the naked short sellers then  blow the investigation all out of proportion. They set outto destroy the stock price with their band of criminal syndicates which includes the banks. They are often joined by law firms that maliciously file shareholder class lawsuit announcements to inspire fear in the marketplace — this is outright tortious interference and market manipulation.

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Article: Houston, Pot Stock Namaste Technologies Has a Problem

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Houston, Pot Stock Namaste Technologies Has a Problem

Sean Williams, 07 February 2019

On early Monday morning, Feb. 4, Namaste Technologies (OTC:NXTTF), a small-cap cannabis company known best for selling vaporizers and starting up a medical cannabis portal known as NamasteMD, issued a press release that announced the termination of its CEO Sean Dollinger, with cause. Before we get to the specifics of this press release and why Dollinger was relieved of his leadership role, it helps to have some background on why this press release was necessary.

Back in October, noted short-seller Citron Research, which is headed by Andrew Left, released a report alleging that Namaste Technologies was a “complete fraud.” Left accused Namaste of making a “fake claim of a Nasdaq listing to get investors to buy the stock” and, more importantly, claimed to have uncovered a related party sale tied to the company’s divestiture of Dollinger Enterprises in Nov. 2017.
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