From Alan Abelson's column in this week's Barrons:
[...] While we're looking back, on November 29, 1999, we penned a piece on Countryland Wellness Resorts.
The company was trying to sell stock and had put out a kind of roughhewn red herring that smelled distinctly fishy. For one thing, it listed Morgan Stanley as the lead underwriter, but Morgan Stanley, it emerged, was completely ignorant of offering and company.
Billing itself as a gold and silver mining outfit, Countryland said it planned to establish a resort where folks could learn to live longer through its exclusive Life Extension Program. Some Abbott-and-Costello conversation with the head man, a Dr. Cruz, did nothing to quell our skepticism.
The spoilsport SEC has cracked down. Among the agency's charges: "Dirt stored in a warehouse was reported as gold" worth as much as $27.3 million; mining reserves, carried at up to $2.1 billion, were never proved up; and Indonesian bank guarantees, listed as worth $400 million-$1.1 billion, didn't exist.
Doesn't look like we'll get to take that Life Extension Program, after all. Who cheered?
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