John / Billybob
I get that crap all the time, it goes straight in my spam blacklist folder. But those f-ing creeps keep changing their email addresses, so the spam filter doesn't do much.
Thanx for the info.The only people who make any money off those stocks are the crooks selling them.Read a good article several yrs back about the prevelance of outfits like these hawking stocks of questionable value.Basically con-artists in suits.
Trying to put a stop to such things is a large part of my day in and day out working life.
The scam is called a "pump and dump". What happens is company insiders or associates or scum stock brokerage firms take or acquire a position in a penny stock. Volume on the stock is generated, soometimes with related party trades, sometimes with spam e-mails, and sometimes with the BS "phone messages" that Alberta's Child referred to.
The idea is to get the stock to increase in value by hyping it and making it look like there is an active or growing market (pump) and then when it gets to a certain point, the scammers in the know unload their positions for a tidy profit (dump).
I probably should have made this offer years ago, but if any FReeper is considering investing with an individual or firm that you want checked out, FReepmail me, and I may be able to save you some money. At the very least, I might be able to cut down on my workload downstream.
Amazing how many rotten people there are in the world that do rotten things to other people, just for a few bucks.
Even more dangerous than the spam for penny stocks is the MSM business news spam that is essentially the sell side's propaganda organ.
The best commentary on current markets that I have found is Bill Cara at http://www.billcara.com/
I've followed him for some time and find him excellent. Although like me he's Canadian, he offers insightful commentary on the US markets.
He is also helpful in my area of interest, Canadian junior mines.
I started getting these when I signed up for a recipe e-mail. I've since unsubscribed the recipe service, so I hope these stupid emails will stop.
I'm no fan of stock scammers, but:
1) Anyone who would buy any stock based on an e-mail from a stranger with no verifiable e-mail address and a subject line reading "pumice acutely", "single ruinous", or "steering deportation" is too stupid to be allowed to handle money in the first place, and might as well buy into these stock scams, because if they don't, they'll just blow their money on a Nigerian e-mail scam instead, and the result will be same for the "investor"; and
2) Some of these companies are perfectly legitimate (though not exactly stellar successes). These e-mail and message board scammers don't necessarily have any connection to the company which issued the stock. They're often just buying random dirt-cheap stock, spreading all this phony publicity around, which causes a bunch of suckers to buy some and drive the price up, and then they quickly sell while the suckers are still buying. This can all happen with no involvement from the issuing company, which may not even find out it happened until after the fact, and can't really do anything to stop it anyway. Attempts to do this sort of thing with major exchange-traded stocks are quickly foiled by the exchanges, but pink sheet and foreign OTC stocks just don't have anyone monitoring the trading in them on a real-time basis.
I can't figure out how they got my email address, because suddenly I started getting tons of these. Of course I just delete them, but they ARE annoying.
susie
What! You mean my Chinese gold mine stock isn't legit? That sudanese broker swore it would make me millions! Good thing I only bought a dollars worth.
Go get 'em Billybob
Penny stocks? Tsk, tsk ...
I can't seem to get my filter to recognize them. It's because they use "word salad" and there's nothing consistant for the filter to lock onto.
Once in a while I make note of one of these 'highly recommended' stocks and check back a few days or weeks later. Seems like none of them ever go anywhere except just sag lower and lower.
John, here are some other stocks to avoid:
KL - Kennedy Limos
HS - Hillary's Secret
THS - Te-RAY-Za Hair Styling
So I collected them for a few weeks, and I tracked the predicted results.
The results were, that EVERY SINGLE PUMPED STOCK LOST NO LESS THAN 50% OF IT'S VALUE.
EVERY LAST ONE.
Some lost much more than that.
Leave one up this as News/Activism. Don't even consider moving back to Chat. It's so relevant to consevative issues. Don't waste a minute thinking about who it's posted by -- it's just oh so important. :/
Good one.