Mark, don't worry about it. Ed Durante couldn't write in English either.
Btw
Does the name Henry Weingarten mean anything to you?
>By Bloomberg News
NEW YORK — A self-proclaimed "financial astrologist" and 20 others swindled investors in four companies, including one in Bellevue, out of more than $30 million, the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) said in lawsuits yesterday.
At the center of the alleged schemes was stock promoter Edward Durante, who used offshore companies he controlled to manipulate penny stocks, the SEC said.
In one of four lawsuits the agency filed in New York yesterday, Durante is accused of hiring Henry Weingarten, a financial adviser who relies on astrology to manage investments, to tout a stock on his Web site. Weingarten has denied the allegations.
"Defendants reaped more than $30 million in illegal profits by secretly controlling the trading in these stocks through a network of promoters, brokers and market makers, and then by dumping the stocks at artificially inflated prices to unsuspecting investors," the SEC said in a statement.
Stocks allegedly manipulated were AbsoluteFuture.com, a Bellevue-based software developer, as well as U.N. Dollars, Wamex Holdings and Ramoil Management. All trade on the Over-the-Counter Bulletin Board, home to many small companies that don't meet the big stock exchanges' listing conditions.
Former officers of the companies are also accused in the civil suits. Officials with Wamex, Ramoil and U.N. Dollars either couldn't be reached or didn't return calls. Kevin Murphy, the new chief executive for AbsoluteFuture.com, said all of the company's previous officers and directors had resigned.
"We're doing our best to salvage the company," he said. |
