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Non-Tech : Auric Goldfinger's Short List -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: SiouxPal who wrote (11853)	7/12/2003 12:49:02 PM
From: StockDung	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 19428

RE:SJCK->Boca firm plunges after online allegationshttp://www.palmbeachpost.com/business/content/auto/epaper/ed... By Ted Jackson, Palm Beach Post Staff Writer Saturday, July 12, 2003 Shares of Spear & Jackson plummeted Friday after a report questioned the accounting practices of the Boca Raton-based hand-tool maker. The report was issued by William Harris of StockLemon.com, a Web site devoted to "exposing lemons" in the Over-the-Counter Bulletin Board stock market, where the smallest of companies trade. While Harris was unavailable for comment late Friday afternoon, he is of a class of investor/researcher that trolls the OTC-BB looking for problems, typically profiting by selling shares in companies before research reports are released. Another Boca Raton company, Eagle Building Technologies, was exposed in this way last year by Anthony Eligindy of San Diego on InsideTruth.com. Eagle Building's offices were raided by the Securities and Exchange Commission, sending the stock down 80 percent before it was halted. On Friday, Spear & Jackson's (OTC-BB: SJCK) shares fell 38 percent to $7.20, on volume 10 times the average for a single day's trading. A year ago, the stock was trading around $1. The Spear & Jackson report began, as these reports often do, by discussing the allegedly unsavory past of the company chief executive, in this case Dennis Crowley. Harris describes Crowley as a "notorious stock promoter." Crowley was barred from the securities industry for life in the 1990s while working for First Jersey Securities, which later collapsed amid a flurry of fraudulent dealing, according to Dow Jones. Crowley could not be reached for comment Friday. West Palm Beach-based Jacuzzi Brands sold Spear & Jackson to Crowley for a song last year, probably in an effort to rid itself of an unfunded $30 million pension liability, according to StockLemon. Jacuzzi Brands could not be reached for comment. SEC filings made in January, using numbers provided by BDO Dunwoody accountants of Canada, showed the $30 million pension liability. But the liability suddenly reappeared five months later in another filing as a $14 million asset under new accountants, StockLemon said. "We would like the government to look into the accounting of this company," Harris said in his report. Spear & Jackson said it would have no comment on its accounting at this time. The Nasdaq Stock Market, which owns the Bulletin Board, scrapped plans to reform the market two weeks ago as part of a cost-cutting drive. ted_jackson@pbpost.com