The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has announced yesterday that it has charged six individuals and their companies with participating in international microcap fraud schemes.
The above-mentioned schemes generated more than $35 million of illegal sales of stock in at least 45 microcap companies.
According to the regulator, Steve M. Bajic and Rajesh Taneja helped shareholders secretly dump large quantities of microcap stock. Christopher McKnight and Aaron Wise fraudulently transferred, and hid the sources of, funds used to promote several of the microcap stocks.
The illegal stock sales were coordinated with Kenneth Ciapala, Anthony Killarney, and Swiss-based company Blacklight SA, who also facilitated the sale of millions of unregistered shares of EMS Find Inc.
The charges here highlight our work with overseas securities regulators to root out players who use microcap markets to take advantage of U.S. investors,” said Paul Levenson, Director of the SEC’s Boston Regional Office. “Investors can help protect themselves from microcap fraud by using the tools and resources on Investor.gov.
The SEC charged the individuals and their companies with acting as unregistered broker-dealers, as well as aiding and abetting the fraudulent stock sales and violating the antifraud and registration provisions of the federal securities laws.