Securities Lawyers Blog
The securities lawyers of Gana Weinstein LLP recently filed a complaint on behalf of a client alleging that William Fox (Fox) and The Fox Alliance, registered with New England Securities (now MML Investors Services LLC) and First Allied Securities, Inc., (First Allied) and the firms failed to supervise Fox’s recommendations and investment activity in alternative investments. The complaint alleges that Fox constructed an investment plan for the Claimants that violated multiple securities laws.
Claimants trusted their investment advisor to prudently invest their income savings that was to be used for their retirement. Fox’s website boasts that the firm’s definition means “a collaboration designed with the intent of leveraging expertise, increasing returns and/or appropriately reducing risk for the parties involved.” Further, Fox claims to provide investors with “institutional caliber investments.”
However, the Claimants alleged that in fact Fox did the exact opposite of what he claims and abused Claimants’ trust by recommending an investment strategy consisting of large concentrations in illiquid, low-quality, speculative, high commission alternative investments that no institution would ever touch. For more than a decade the claim stated that Fox recommended that Claimants invest over $2 million in illiquid securities such as non-traded real estate investment trusts (Non-Traded REITs), private placements, equipment leasing programs, oil and gas programs, and annuities. Of the nearly $3 million Claimants gave Fox to invest the vast majority ended up in these types of programs.