DJ The Lawyer at the Center of SEC Pump-and-Dump Case -- Barrons.com
DJ The Lawyer at the Center of SEC Pump-and-Dump Case -- Barrons.com
DJ The Lawyer at the Center of SEC Pump-and-Dump Case -- Barrons.com
美國證券交易委員會運轉案的核心律師DJ--巴倫網
By Bill Alpert
比爾·阿爾伯特著
In a stock fraud suit filed last month by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, regulators allege that billionaire drug entrepreneur Phillip Frost and his company Opko Health participated in pump-and-dump schemes organized by investor Barry Honig.
在美國證券交易委員會上個月提起的股票欺詐訴訟中，監管機構指控億萬富翁毒品企業家菲利普·弗羅斯特和他的公司Opko Health參與了投資者巴里·霍尼格組織的哄抬和拋售計劃。
The complaint in Manhattan's federal district court says that Honig and his associates bought stock in three small companies, controlled the firms' managements, and planted promotional articles about them before unloading their shares. The schemers reaped more than $27 million, the SEC charges, before leaving public investors with virtually worthless stock.
曼哈頓聯邦地區法院的起訴書説，霍尼格和他的同夥購買了三家小公司的股票，控制了這些公司的管理層，並在拋售它們的股票之前植入了關於它們的促銷文章。美國證券交易委員會指控稱，這些陰謀者獲利2700多萬美元，卻給公眾投資者留下了幾乎一文不值的股票。
Unmentioned in the SEC's case is how all three public companies in the alleged swindles used the same securities law firm and the same stock transfer agency. SEC filings over the past decade show that nearly two dozen public companies backed by Honig, or other defendants in last month's SEC complaint, used securities lawyer Harvey Kesner, a 61-year old partner at the leading small-cap law firm Sichenzia Ross Ference, until he retired from the firm just before the SEC action. Those companies also happened to use Equity Stock Transfer, a New York outfit that SEC registrations show was financed and controlled by Kesner.
美國證券交易委員會案中沒有提到的是，涉嫌詐騙的三家上市公司是如何利用同一家證券事務所和同一家股票轉讓機構的。美國證券交易委員會過去十年的備案文件顯示，由霍尼格或上個月美國證券交易委員會訴訟中的其他被告支持的近20多家上市公司曾聘請證券律師哈維·凱斯納，直到他在美國證券交易委員會訴訟前夕從該公司退休。凱斯納現年61歲，是領先的小盤股律師事務所Sinhenzia Ross Ference的合夥人。這些公司還碰巧使用了股權轉讓公司，美國證券交易委員會的註冊記錄顯示，這家紐約機構由凱斯納出資並控制。
A prominent Honig-backed firm that Kesner represented was Riot Blockchain (ticker: RIOT), whose shares rose tenfold in last year's cryptocurrency surge, to $46, before falling back to a recent $3.40. Riot wasn't named in the SEC's case, but its chief executive, John O'Rourke, was. He has resigned and said he'll fight the civil charges that he colluded in Honig's alleged swindles.
凱斯納所代表的一家著名的Honig支持的公司是Riot BlockChain(股票代碼：Riot)，其股價在去年加密貨幣飆升中上漲了10倍，至46美元，然後回落至最近的3.40美元。美國證券交易委員會案中沒有提到Riot，但其首席執行長奧魯爾克(John O‘Rourke)提到了。他已經辭職，並表示將與他合謀參與霍尼格涉嫌詐騙的民事指控進行抗爭。
Following the SEC charges, Frost stepped down as chairman from the brokerage firm he controls, Ladenburg Thalmann Financial Services (LTS). The 81-year-old Frost and Opko (OPK) deny the wrongdoings alleged in the SEC's action. Honig has made no public statement. He did not respond to Barron's requests for comment. One defendant, John H. Ford, quickly settled the SEC's charges, without admitting or denying allegations that he took undisclosed payments to tout a couple of the stocks on the website SeekingAlpha.com.
在美國證券交易委員會受到指控後，弗羅斯特辭去了他控制的經紀公司拉登堡·塔爾曼金融服務公司(LTS)的董事長一職。81歲的弗羅斯特和奧普科(OPK)否認了美國證券交易委員會行動中的不當行為。霍尼格尚未發表公開聲明。他沒有迴應巴倫的置評請求。其中一名被告約翰·H·福特很快就美國證券交易委員會的指控達成和解，他既沒有承認也沒有否認有關他收受未披露的款項在SeekingAlpha.com網站上兜售幾隻股票的指控。
Securities lawyers and transfer agents are essential gatekeepers under federal regulations meant to protect the investing public. But one of the three companies featured in the SEC's New York case, the tiny biotech firm MabVax Therapeutics Holdings (MBVX), says that Honig forced it to hire Kesner and the Sichenzia Ross firm as a condition of his financing, according to a little-noted malpractice case that MabVax filed in a San Diego state court after the SEC case became public.
根據旨在保護投資公眾的聯邦法規，證券律師和轉讓代理是必不可少的看門人。但美國證券交易委員會紐約案曝光後，馬布瓦克斯向聖地亞哥州法院提起的一起鮮為人知的醫療事故官司顯示，作為融資的條件，霍尼格強迫霍尼格聘請凱斯納和西森齊亞·羅斯公司，這三家公司中的一家是生物技術公司美巴華治療控股有限公司。
The MabVax suit contends that Kesner and his law firm advanced the interests of Honig at the expense of MabVax, deceiving the company and committing malpractice that led to its delisting from Nasdaq. Although MabVax had retained Kesner's law firm "to keep the company safe," says the biotech's complaint, Kesner's firm instead "put MabVax in harm's way."
MabVax的訴訟稱，凱斯納和他的律師事務所以犧牲MabVax為代價，推進了Honig的利益，欺騙了該公司，並犯下了導致其從納斯達克退市的不當行為。生物科技公司的起訴書稱，儘管MabVax保留了Kesner的律師事務所，以“保護公司的安全”，但Kesner的律師事務所卻“將MabVax置於危險境地”。
Neither Kesner nor Equity Stock Transfer responded to Barron's requests for comment or in court filings. Kesner's former firm strongly denies that it wronged its client MabVax. "There are very serious misstatements and misleading facts alleged in the complaint, as well as errors in law, " says Mark Anesh, a malpractice specialist from the firm Lewis Brisbois, who will represent Sichenzia Ross' lawyers in the California case, but not Kesner. "The firm intends to vigorously defend the lawsuit, and in the end we fully expect that the claims contained therein will be found to be completely and utterly without merit."
凱斯納和Equity Stock Transfer都沒有迴應巴倫的置評請求，也沒有在提交給法庭的文件中做出迴應。凱斯納的前公司強烈否認它冤枉了客户MabVax。劉易斯·布里斯布瓦律師事務所的醫療事故專家馬克·阿內什表示：“起訴書中指控存在非常嚴重的錯誤陳述和誤導性事實，以及法律上的錯誤。”他將在加州案件中代表西琴西亞·羅斯的律師，而不是凱斯納。該公司打算積極為這起訴訟辯護，最終我們完全預計，訴訟中包含的索賠將被發現完全、完全沒有根據。
Kesner was a rainmaker at many of the firms where he worked. Before Sichenzia Ross Ference Kesner -- as the New York firm was known until Kesner's August departure -- he'd been with the Dallas firm Haynes and Boone until the firm terminated him in 2009. In a lawsuit that was quickly settled, Kesner demanded $15 million from the Dallas firm and alleged that its partners defamed him by telling others "Harvey is dirty" and "had relationships with clients that the firm did not wish to associate with."
凱斯納是他工作過的許多公司的造雨者。在凱斯納離開之前，他一直在達拉斯的海恩斯-布恩律師事務所工作，直到公司在2009年解僱了他。在一場很快就了結的訴訟中，凱斯納要求這家達拉斯律師事務所賠償1500萬美元，並指控其合夥人誹謗他，告訴其他人“哈維是骯髒的”，並且“與公司不願與之交往的客户有關係”。
A Haynes and Boone spokesman said, "Mr. Kesner left the firm in March of 2009. We resolved our disputes at that time and have had no further contact with him."
海恩斯和布恩的一位發言人説，“凱斯納先生於2009年3月離開了公司。我們當時解決了糾紛，再也沒有與他取得聯繫。”
After arriving at Sichenzia Ross in 2009, Kesner helped build the firm into one of the busiest securities law practices in America's small-cap stock market. The firm's website has been intermittently offline lately while it scrubs mentions of Kesner, but it had featured many tombstone announcements of deals that SEC filings show were bankrolled by Honig, Frost, and their investing associates. Sichenzia Ross' website said that it "consistently ranked at the top of national league table rankings for issuer, investor and placement-agent legal counsel."
凱斯納在2009年來到四川羅斯後，幫助該公司成為美國小盤股市場最繁忙的證券法業務之一。該公司的網站最近一直斷斷續續地下線，同時也刪除了凱斯納的名字，但美國證券交易委員會的備案文件顯示，許多交易的墓碑公告都是由霍尼格、弗羅斯特及其投資夥伴提供資金的。Sinhenzia Ross的網站表示，該公司“在發行人、投資者和配售代理法律顧問方面一直位居全國排行榜榜首。”
In MabVax's California complaint against the law firm, the biotech says that Honig and his associates forced MabVax to hire Kesner as part of a 2015 financing. The complaint says that Kesner later said that he worked on at least five deals a year for Honig's investment group. MabVax said it had found 22 other companies backed by Honig's group where "Sichenzia and Kesner have been inserted as counsel."
在MabVax在加州對這家律師事務所的控訴中，這家生物技術公司表示，霍尼格和他的同事迫使MabVax聘請凱斯納，作為2015年融資的一部分。起訴書説，凱斯納後來説，他每年至少為霍尼格的投資集團做五筆交易。MabVax表示，它還發現了另外22家得到霍尼格集團支持的公司，在這些公司中，“西申齊亞和凱斯納已經被任命為律師”。
MabVax claims that the advice it got from Kesner was secretly designed to serve clients such as Honig. In 2015, MabVax alleges that Kesner tipped Honig off to a potential legal issue that weakened his control over the company. Honig repaired his position and then forced MabVax to issue $10 million worth of securities -- for free -- to Honig and his investment associates, who secretly included Kesner.
MabVax聲稱，它從凱斯納那裏得到的建議是祕密設計的，旨在為霍尼格等客户提供服務。2015年，MabVax聲稱，凱斯納向霍尼格透露了一個潛在的法律問題，削弱了他對公司的控制。霍尼格修復了自己的頭寸，然後迫使MabVax向霍尼格和他的投資夥伴免費發行了價值1,000萬美元的證券，其中祕密包括凱斯納。
The company also says that Kesner's law firm inserted legal language in Honig's deals so that the investors could deny that they were acting as a controlling group. But doubts about the legitimacy of Kesner's techniques have since forced MabVax to disclaim four years worth of its previous SEC filings, alleges the company, and caused its Nasdaq delisting.
該公司還表示，凱斯納的律師事務所在霍尼格的交易中插入了法律語言，這樣投資者就可以否認他們是控股集團。但該公司聲稱，由於對凱斯納技術合法性的懷疑，該公司被迫放棄了之前四年提交的美國證券交易委員會申請，並導致其納斯達克退市。
Sichenzia Ross' outside counsel in the MabVax case, Anesh, would not comment on any details alleged by MabVax. As for MabVax, it declined to comment through its outside attorney, Joel Fleming of Block & Leviton.
西申齊亞·羅斯在MabVax案件中的外部律師Anesh不願對MabVax聲稱的任何細節發表評論。至於MabVax，它拒絕通過其外部律師、Block&Leviton的喬爾·弗萊明置評。
A key player in the world of small-cap finance is a company's stock transfer agent, which can allow the sale of unregistered shares and convert warrants or preferred shares into common stock. In the SEC action against Honig and his associates, the agency says the group used "false attorney opinion letters" to get a transfer agent to remove restrictions from Honig's share certificates, so that Honig could sell the unregistered stock. The transfer agent for the public companies involved in the SEC case -- and more than another dozen funded by Honig -- was Equity Stock Transfer.
小盤股融資領域的一個關鍵角色是公司的股票轉讓代理，它可以允許出售未登記的股票，並將認股權證或優先股轉換為普通股。在美國證券交易委員會對霍尼格和他的同夥的訴訟中，該機構表示，該組織使用“虛假的律師意見書”，讓轉讓代理取消對霍尼格股票的限制，這樣霍尼格就可以出售未登記的股票。美國證券交易委員會案以及霍尼格出資的另外十幾家上市公司的股權轉讓代理機構就是股權轉讓公司。
Equity Stock Transfer's initial SEC registration in 2011 says that it was funded by one of Kesner's limited-liability companies and managed by Avital Even-Shoshan, a partner who just left Sichenzia Ross and one of the defendants in MabVax's case. Other SEC filings said that the transfer agency's "control persons" included Kesner, his wife Renee, and an employee of Kesner's law firms, Mohit Bhansali.
股權轉讓最初在2011年進行的美國證券交易委員會登記顯示，它由凱斯納的一家有限責任公司出資，由剛剛離開四川羅斯的合夥人、馬布瓦克斯一案的被告之一阿維塔爾·埃文-肖山管理。美國證券交易委員會的其他文件稱，轉會機構的“控制人”包括凱斯納、他的妻子蕾妮，以及凱斯納律師事務所的一名僱員莫希特·班薩利。
In its March 2018 registration with the SEC, the transfer agency said that it still owed money to Kesner and that its ownership was divided between Bhansali and an Atlanta management consultant named Michael Beeghley. Both Bhansali and Beeghley have served as directors of Honig-backed companies, including Riot Blockchain and PolarityTE (PTE), a Salt Lake City biotech startup whose $18 shares value the unprofitable company at about $400 million.
在2018年3月在美國證券交易委員會的註冊中，這家轉會機構表示，它仍欠凱斯納的錢，其所有權由班薩利和亞特蘭大一位名叫邁克爾·比格利的管理顧問平分。Bhansali和Beeghley都曾擔任Honig支持的公司的董事，包括Riot BlockChain和鹽湖城生物科技初創公司PolarityTE(Pte)，後者18美元的股票對這家沒有盈利的公司的估值約為4億美元。
"Stock transfer agents are the gatekeepers of securities," says Bhansali in an online video interview linked on the transfer agency's website. "Security for securities, that's what we do!" Neither Equity Stock Transfer, Bhansali, nor Beeghley responded to Barron's questions about the transfer agency.
“股票轉讓機構是證券的看門人，”Bhansali在該轉讓機構網站上鍊接的一段在線視頻採訪中説。“為證券提供安全保障，這就是我們的工作！”股權轉讓、Bhansali和Beeghley都沒有迴應Barron關於轉讓機構的問題。
Riot Blockchain's interim Chief Executive Chris Ensey says his company no longer uses Kesner as its securities lawyer or Equity Stock Transfer as its transfer agent. PolarityTE still uses the transfer agent, but stopped using Kesner and the Sichenzia Ross law firm in the spring of 2018. Unlike MabVax, PolarityTE's managers say they were satisfied with Kesner's legal advice. "We were never forced to use Mr. Kesner," says PolarityTE Chief Operating Officer Edward Swanson.
Riot BlockChain的臨時首席執行長克里斯·恩西説，他的公司不再使用凱斯納作為證券律師，也不再使用股權轉讓作為轉讓代理。PolarityTE仍在使用轉會代理，但在2018年春季停止使用凱斯納和西琴齊亞·羅斯律師事務所。與MabVax不同，PolarityTE的經理們表示，他們對凱斯納的法律建議感到滿意。PolarityTE首席運營官愛德華·斯旺森説：“我們從未被迫使用凱斯納先生。”
Write to Bill Alpert at william.alpert@barrons.com
寫信給Bill Alpert，電子郵件：william.alpert@Barrons.com
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(完)道瓊斯通訊社
October 04, 2018 13:50 ET (17:50 GMT)
2018年10月4日東部時間13：50(格林尼治標準時間17：50)
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