Articles Tagged with ICM Capital Markets

In our prior post, our offices, Gana Weinstein LLP, noted its investigation of the July 17, 2014, claims brought by securities and exchange commission (SEC) against Craig Josephberg in connection with his participation in a $300 million securities fraud market manipulation scheme. The SEC brought charges against Abraxas J. Discala (Discala), Marc E. Wexler (Wexler), Matthew A. Bell (Bell), Craig L. Josephberg (Josephberg), and Ira Shapiro (Shapiro), for manipulating the stock price of four publically traded companies, CodeSmart Holdings, Inc. (CodeSmart), Cubed, StarStream Entertainment Inc., and the Staffing Group, Ltd.

According to the complaint, in 2013, Discala and Wexler conspired with registered representatives Bell and Josephberg to inflate the price of the stock of CodeSmart. The SEC found that Discala, Wexler, Bell, and Josephberg then profited by selling their shares at inflated values at the expense of Bell’s clients and Josephberg’s customers.

Josephberg has a long and troubled regulatory, criminal activity, debts, customer complaints, among a host of other supervisory “red flags” of potential misconduct in the handling of his clients. Josephberg entered the securities industry in 1996. Thereafter, he was associated with eight different firms including Maxim Group LLC, ICM Capital Markets, LTD, vFinance Investments, Inc., Halcyon Cabot Partners, LTD. (Halcoyon), and most recently Meyers Associates, L.P. (Meyers Associates). Indeed, when Josephberg was terminated from Halcoyon he was under investigation by the firm for sales practice violations including the selling of unsuitable securities, unauthorized trades, and securities fraud in connection with the sale of penny stocks including VHGI and Cell Therapeutics.