Maureen Sloan, 63, of Newport Beach, Calif., claims former LPL Financial L.L.C. broker Alberto Neira stole $4.5 million from her through a fraudulent auto-financing scheme called Silver Oak Leasing. Ms. Sloan said she lost another $4 million in unsuitable trading of preferred stock. Ms. Sloan is the granddaughter of Walter Knott, founder of the Buena Park, Calif.-based Knott's Berry Farm.

Mr. Neira appears to have been associated with LPL Financial L.L.C. since February 2002.

LPL Financial LLC terminated Mr. Neira in January 2011 for "failure to fully discl...

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A federal court for the District Court for the Central District of Illinois entered an injunction against Timothy J.Roth, of Urbana, Illinois, a stockbroker with the NJ based firm Comprehensive Capital Management, Inc. for stealing more than $16 million of his clients’ mutual fund shares, liquidating the shares, and sending the ill-gotten gains to various accounts and companies under his control.

The judgment permanently enjoins Roth from violating the antifraud provisions of the federal securities laws. Roth consented to the judgment.

According to the
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Between May 2006 and August 2008, Citigroup raised over $71 billion dollars the offerings of bonds, and its preferred stocks, (which are not bonds, as their yields are merely precatory), to investors whom may have otherwise been led to believe were safe, conservative, higher than average yield investments.

However, as set forth in the Consolidated Amended Class Action Complaint filed in the Southern District of New York, it was alleged that Citigroup sold these securities, w...

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It is OK to steal as long as you do not steal too much to get a greedy lawyer involved.

In the good old days, if you stole $100 from 2 million people, or $200 million, although no competent greedy lawyer would be willing to undertake your representation to recover your $100, the class action bar would line up to file a claim or class action lawsuit on your behalf and on behalf of all others similarly situated, to seek to recover the $200 million on behalf of the class of persons whom were also ripped off. Indeed, for smaller claims, the class action lawsuit is, and has been th...

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Everyone thinks that bonds, including U.S. Treasury Bonds are safe investments. Think again. If interest rates, which are at historical lows, rise, the market prices of bonds go down. Longer term bond prices go down real far down, and mutual funds that invest or trade bonds, will get hardest hit, and this has nothing to do with a credit rating, or the issuers’ ability to pay.

For example, if interest rates are 4%, and double to 8%, a thirty year bond which was purchased at par, let us say $100 per bond, would by definition lose 40% of its value.

Now of course,...

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