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"Pump and dump" (P&D) is a form of securities fraud that involves artificially inflating the price of an owned stock through false and misleading positive statements, in order to sell the cheaply purchased stock at a higher price. Once the operators of the scheme "dump" (sell) their overvalued shares, the price falls and investors lose their money. This is most common with small cap cryptocurrencies and very small corporations/companies, i.e. "microcaps".
Jonathan G. Lebed is an American businessman and former stock trader who reached an out of court civil settlement with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) at age 15 for stock manipulation.
Penny stocks are common shares of small public companies that trade for less than one dollar per share.
In business, the term boiler room refers to an outbound call center selling questionable investments by telephone. It usually refers to a room where salespeople work using unfair, dishonest sales tactics, sometimes selling penny stocks or private placements or committing outright stock fraud. A common boiler room tactic is the use of falsified and bolstered information in combination with verified company-released information. The term carries a negative connotation; it is often used to imply high-pressure sales tactics and, sometimes, poor working conditions.
The OTC (Over-The-Counter) Bulletin Board or OTCBB is a United States quotation medium operated by the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA) for its subscribing members.
OTC Markets Group is an American financial market providing price and liquidity information for almost 10,000 over-the-counter (OTC) securities. The group has its headquarters in New York City. OTC-traded securities are organized into three markets to inform investors of opportunities and risks: OTCQX, OTCQB and Pink.
Ketan Parekh is a former stockbroker from Mumbai, who was convicted in 2008 for involvement in the Indian stock market manipulation scam that occurred from late 1998 to 2001. During this period, Parekh artificially rigged prices of certain chosen securities, using large sums of money borrowed from banks including the Madhavpura Mercantile Co-operative Bank, of which he himself was a director.
Front running, also known as tailgating, is the prohibited practice of entering into an equity (stock) trade, option, futures contract, derivative, or security-based swap to capitalize on advance, nonpublic knowledge of a large ("block") pending transaction that will influence the price of the underlying security. In essence, it means the practice of engaging in a Personal Securities Transaction in advance of a transaction in the same security for a client's account. Front running is considered a form of market manipulation in many markets. Cases typically involve individual brokers or brokerage firms trading stock in and out of undisclosed, unmonitored accounts of relatives or confederates. Institutional and individual investors may also commit a front running violation when they are privy to inside information. A front running firm either buys for its own account before filling customer buy orders that drive up the price, or sells for its own account before filling customer sell orders that drive down the price. Front running is prohibited since the front-runner profits from nonpublic information, at the expense of its own customers, the block trade, or the public market.
A stock trader or equity trader or share trader is a person or company involved in trading equity securities and attempting to profit from the purchase and sale of those securities. Stock traders may be an investor, agent, hedger, arbitrageur, speculator, or stockbroker. Such equity trading in large publicly traded companies may be through a stock exchange. Stock shares in smaller public companies may be bought and sold in over-the-counter (OTC) markets or in some instances in equity crowdfunding platforms.
Securities fraud, also known as stock fraud and investment fraud, is a deceptive practice in the stock or commodities markets that induces investors to make purchase or sale decisions on the basis of false information, frequently resulting in losses, in violation of securities laws.
Robert Emmet Brennan is an American businessman and former accountant who built the infamous penny stock brokerage firm, First Jersey Securities. The firm specialized in promoting "Pump and dump" penny stocks to unsuspecting investors, many of them elderly, who lost their entire investments when the stocks inevitably crashed.
In business and investing, term microcap stock refers to the stock of public companies in the United States which have a market capitalization of roughly $50 million to $300 million. The shares of companies with a market capitalization of less than $50 million are typically referred to as nano-cap stocks. Many micro-cap and nano-cap stocks are traded over-the-counter with their prices quoted on the OTCBB, OTC Link LLC, or the Pink Sheets. The larger, more established micro-caps are listed on the NASDAQ Capital Market or American Stock Exchange (AMEX).
Stratton Oakmont, Inc. was a Long Island, New York, "over-the-counter" brokerage house founded in 1989 by Jordan Belfort and Danny Porush. It defrauded many shareholders, leading to the arrest and incarceration of several executives and the closing of the firm in 1996.
The Vancouver Stock Exchange (VSE) was a stock exchange based in Vancouver, British Columbia. It was incorporated 1906. On November 29, 1999 the VSE was merged into the Canadian Venture Exchange (CDNX).
Market manipulation is a type of market abuse where there is a deliberate attempt to interfere with the free and fair operation of the market; the most blatant of cases involve creating false or misleading appearances with respect to the price of, or market for, a product, security or commodity.
Microcap stock fraud is a form of securities fraud involving stocks of "microcap" companies, generally defined in the United States as those with a market capitalization of under $250 million. Its prevalence has been estimated to run into the billions of dollars a year. Many microcap stocks are penny stocks, which the SEC defines as a security that trades at less than $5 per share, is not listed on a national exchange, and fails to meet other specific criteria.
In finance, stock consists of all of the shares into which ownership of a corporation or company is divided. A single share of the stock means fractional ownership of the corporation in proportion to the total number of shares. This typically entitles the shareholder (stockholder) to that fraction of the company's earnings, proceeds from liquidation of assets, or voting power, often dividing these up in proportion to the amount of money each stockholder has invested. Not all stock is necessarily equal, as certain classes of stock may be issued for example without voting rights, with enhanced voting rights, or with a certain priority to receive profits or liquidation proceeds before or after other classes of shareholders.
Daniel Mark Porush is an American businessman and former stock broker who ran a "pump and dump" stock fraud scheme in the 1990s. In 1999, he was convicted of securities fraud and money laundering at the Stratton Oakmont brokerage, for which he served 39 months in prison. The character of Donnie Azoff, portrayed by Jonah Hill in the 2013 film The Wolf of Wall Street, was loosely based on Porush, although Porush described the portrayal as inaccurate. After prison, Porush became involved with a Florida-based medical supply company, Med-Care, which was the subject of federal investigations.
John Babikian aka "Wolf of Montreal" is a Canadian penny stock promoter. In 2013, at the age of 25 years old, he became the subject of international media attention after his $100 million divorce in the province of Quebec was made public. The case files of the divorce revealed a considerable amount of assets which were being dissimulated around the world.
George Graham Rice was a convicted stock swindler. He was known as the "Jackal of Wall Street."