Ask Rande

Top 2. Mar 7, 1999 9:30 AM

» RandeS - Tony,

Tony,

First, let me say that if this thread goes accordingly, the title will likely be changed to “Blast Rande.” Second, I want to reprint your related post from another thread along with my response:

Author: TONYBRIG (TONY BRIG)
Date: March 7, 1999 7:05 AM
Subject: Sleeps Well
Ethics is power & strength.
Thiefs have a very low estimation of themselves.
False accusers probably have something to hide.
Or just cant or wont percive properly.
BestofLuck!
TonyfromBklyn

Author: RandeS
Date: March 7, 1999 9:23 AM
Subject: Tony,
Tony,
You have made the most astoundingly incisive and intelligent comment I have ever seen on this or any other website discussion group -- "ethics is power and strength." Sir, you have said it all when it comes to the world of investments and those who would put themselves out as advisors.
Rande Spiegelman

Ethical conduct is the remedy to manipulation while knowledge and experience is the vaccine necessary to protect us from those who don’t practice ethical behavior. More on the history of manipulation later.

-- posted by RandeS

Top 3. Mar 7, 1999 10:06 AM

» RandeS - Tony,

Tony,

This post is going to take some time to rea (quite long) because I've listed some recent excerpts of news articles dealing with modern-day stock manipulation. The final piece is from a "Financial Times" book review -- "Once in Golconda," by Brooks. While "Reminicsences of a Stock Operator" is the classic first-hand account, "Glaconda" appears to provide some broader discussion on the history of stock manipulation. The thing to remember is that fraud and manipulation are alive and well in 1999. The more popular stocks become, the more con artists will appear. After all, the grifter's "stock" in trade is quick riches and the mark's downfall is greed. Here goes:

Newsday (New York, NY): February 20, 1999--
SEC GETS TOUGH ON SMALL-STOCK FRAUD. Extending their fight against small-stock fraud, federal regulators on Friday adopted rule changes aimed at choking off potential stock manipulation before ordinary investors lose money in such schemes. titled "Microcap Stock: A Guide for Investors." The brochure, which offers tips on how to detect and avoid small-stock fraud, is available on the agency's Web site at www. sec. gov and by calling 1-800- SEC -0330. The Securities and Exchange Commission said the new rules are designed to supplement that effort by increasing the amount of information on small companies available to investors and making it harder for people to fraudulently promote stocks.

Akron Beacon Journal: February 26, 1999--
The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission's second nationwide crackdown on Internet-based stock fraud yesterday netted several men in connection with the financial collapse of Interactive MultiMedia Publishers Inc., a former Akron technology company.

The Vancouver Sun: January 9, 1999--
“Scoundrel stock promoters from Vancouver have shifted their business to the OTC bulletin board in the U.S., a penny-stock forum that resembles the VSE in the late 1980s, when Forbes magazine branded it ‘The Scam Capital of the World.’”

The New York Times: May 10, 1998--
“For behind Datek's burgeoning on-line empire in Iselin, N.J., is a securities firm with a murky and blemished past -- a record of aggressive, and sometimes illegal, trading activity; of fines, censures and suspensions, and of shadowy deals involving offshore accounts. And not all of Datek's problems are history. S.E.C. officials are investigating whether Datek was part of a stock manipulation scheme in recent years involving the sale of securities to overseas investors, according to investigators, law enforcement officials and a person supboenaed in the case. The office of the Manhattan District Attorney, meanwhile, says it is looking into whether Datek participated in a money laundering scheme.”

Financial Times (London) April 7, 1998--
"John Brooks tells his tale with grace and wit, says Philip Coggan. But it is unlikely to make a best-seller today. Business books do not often score high marks for literary merit; most offer a mix of the banal and the turgid. But a few rise above the crowd, either by the compelling nature of their story (Barbarians At the Gate, the 1980s saga of the RJR Nabisco takeover) or because of the fluency of the writing (Liar's Poker, Michael Lewis's book about life as a bond salesman). Once in Golconda provides both drama and style - the story of Wall Street between the wars told with grace and wit. Alas, it is unlikely to make the bestseller list. Golconda was a city in south-eastern India where, according to legend, everyone who entered it became rich. That was how Wall Street seemed in the 1920s before the crash ushered in reality and the great depression. It was a wild market for investors; those who are made nervous by the financial scandals of the 1990s would have expired from fright in the 1920s. The most common scam was a pool; speculators would encourage excessive activity in a stock, drawing in individual investors and pushing the price ahead. At the peak, they would withdraw their funds, leaving the price to collapse. Not only were such operations legal but talk of the pools was commonplace and individual investors attempted to take advantage of the manipulation, hoping to ride the bubble and sell out before it popped. The natural twin of the stock pool was the bear raid, in which speculators went short of a stock (sold it, without owning it) in the hope of buying it back at a cheaper price. Individual speculators such as Jesse Livermore and "Sell'em Ben" Smith were masters at these shenanigans. But their actions, forgivable by the authorities and public when Wall Street was rising, brought opprobrium in the straitened times of the 1930s. Franklin Roosevelt, evidently a man with a wicked sense of humour, made one of the most notorious market manipulators, Joseph Kennedy, the first chairman of the Securities Exchange Commission."

Well, Kennedy the "poacher" proved a good guardian after all. Today, even with the SEC and state securities laws on our side, we need to be our own guardians. If you don't agree with anything else Bob Brinker has to say, surely you must agree with this: "YOU are the best financial adivsor you will ever have." Nobody, after all, will care about your finances as you do.

-- posted by RandeS

Top 4. Mar 7, 1999 11:58 AM

» Karin - Rande

Great information here on your thread!
Love to check in.

-- posted by Karin

Top 5. Mar 7, 1999 4:43 PM

» TONYBRIG - Thanks Rande!

I need to really get this so am printing it
out and will study it later.

Awaiting more of same type.

BestofLuck!

-- posted by TONYBRIG

Top 6. Mar 7, 1999 7:49 PM

» RandeS - No prob, Tony.

No prob, Tony. I'll try to pass along anything else I come across on modern-day "boiler room" activity.

-- posted by RandeS

Top 7. Mar 7, 1999 8:10 PM

» JenL_3 - Of Stock Pools and Bear Raids

Rande - Thanks for that information. The comments about Stock Pools and Bear Raids don't sound that much different than what is happening today. We do need to be aware....Jen

-- posted by JenL_3