Free Republic

*snip* The accusations began on Monday when Peregrine’s front-line regulator, the National Futures Association (NFA), hit the firm with an enforcement action prohibiting it from doing any more business after finding that it failed to meet key financial requirements. Yesterday the CFTC, a U.S. regulator, got involved and sued Peregrine for fraud by misappropriating customer funds, violated customer fund segregation laws, and made false statements in financial statements filed with the Commission. This isn’t just another firm going bust because for the second time in less than a year customer funds that should have been protected have gone missing amid...

"Could you just SHUT UP, Bernie?" That is what the South Florida "Mini Madoff" Ponzi schemer, Scott Rothstein, must be thinking about Bernie Madoff who made this recent comment about the people he bilked as reported by New York Magazine: "F--- my victims! I carried them for twenty years, and now I’m doing 150 years.”In a case of incredibly poor timing, this must have been especially painful to Rothstein who will be sentenced for his Ponzi crimes by a judge on Wednesday. In fact, Rothstein, also known for his large political contributions to senate candidate Charlie Crist to the tune...

Those who know wealthy Lebanese Shi'ite financier Salah Ezz el-Din say he is a deeply pious, humble man whose close links to Hezbollah made his credentials impeccable as he allegedly embezzled their savings. Many Shi'ite Lebanese investors find it hard to believe the philanthropist could have defrauded them to the tune of at least $500 million -- small change compared with the $65 billion in the U.S. fraudster Bernard Madoff's Ponzi scheme, but made more painful by the connection with Hezbollah, which its followers regard as incorruptible."Whoever says he's a thief, that is an incorrect assessment," said Fouad Ajami, a...

Whether the 16,000 local investors who had bought US$700 million in PEM Group products would get their money back remained uncertain yesterday ___ Taiwanese-American financier Dan­ny Pang (彭日成), accused by US federal regulators of defrauding investors out of hundreds of millions of dollars, was arrested on Tuesday by the FBI on charges he withdrew about US$360,000 from a company account through dozens of small transactions so he would not have to report the sum to federal regulators. The US attorney’s office said the founder and former chief executive of the Private Equity ­Management (PEM) Group was arrested at his lawyer’s...

Madoff's $50B fraud set off a run on investment companies, sending dominos falling one by one......James Nicholson's Westgate Capital fund tried to reassure investors, sending out $5M in checks - which bounced....$900M may be missing and more than 350 victims. Former Islanders co-owners Paul Greenwood and Stephen Walsh, ran "an egregious fraud of immense proportions," said the SEC.....clients included charitable and university foundations and pension funds...... Records showed that of $812M in assets, $794M were in promissory notes from Greenwood and Walsh.

Texas financier R. Allen Stanford is accused of cheating 50,000 customers out of $8 billion dollars but despite raids Tuesday of his financial empire in Houston, Memphis, and Tupelo, Miss., federal authorities say they do not know the current whereabouts of the CEO. The Securities Exchange Commission alleges Stanford ran a fraud promising investors impossible returns, much like Bernard Madoff's $50 billion alleged Ponzi scheme. Investigators Tuesday shut down and froze the assets of three of the companies Stanford controls and they say the case could grow to be as big as the Madoff scandal. Like Madoff's clients, Stanford's investors...

FEDS SAY HOUSTON BANKER OPERATED $8B SCAM Texan Sir R. Allen Stanford ran a "massive, ongoing fraud," scamming $8 billion by luring investors with unrealistically high returns on offshore bank CDs and mutual funds......and lied about his Madoff investments....... The SEC appointed a receiver to take control of Stanford Financial Group.....58-year-old Stanford's holds citizenship in the US and Antigua, the first American to be knighted by the West Indies island.... his Antigua bank----Stanford International Bank Ltd....touted "a unique investment strategy" purporting to produce double-digit returns ..........