Stock Market and Stock Broker Fraud

Reports of stock market and broker fraud flood current news sources while the U.S. stock market plummets under the weight of almost weekly revelations chronicling blue chip conglomerates’ “cooked books”. Greedy corporate executives reined this financial terror with the knowledgeable assistance of previously respected brokerage houses, prestigious Wall Street stock investment advisors and analysts and well known, major accounting firms. Institutional and individual investors alike (many of the individual investors now laid off employees of the defunct or downsized corporations perpetrating the fraud) suffered catastrophic losses as their investments, retirement accounts, and dreams disintegrated.

Previously well respected, professional financial advisors and brokerage houses Solomon Smith Barney and Merrill Lynch, suspected of committing the most arrant offenses, shirked and perhaps totally ignored their fiduciary duty of protecting clients’ investments. Accusers base their allegations on internal documents revealing Smith Barney and Merrill Lynch financial advisors recommended and even touted stocks, they themselves knew were of little or no value; pushing up the worthless stocks’ market price, all the while collecting monetary and business benefits for themselves.

Unfortunately, the list of guilty parties does not stop with Solomon Smith Barney and Merrill Lynch. WorldCom, Enron Corp., Global Crossing Ltd., Tyco International Ltd., Qwest Communications International and Adelphia Communications corporate executives, seemly in collusion with their professional accounting firms, caused catastrophic financial harm and physical stress to shareholders and employees who helplessly watched their lifetime investments and 401k funds evaporate into rubble.