Private investment in companies has driven innovation and financial success around the world. From pension funds, to mutual funds, to individual accounts, investors rely on one fundamental notion when deciding where to invest their money: that the companies in which they are investing are providing truthful and accurate information. Failure to provide truthful and accurate information results in misguided investments and wrongly-valued stock prices to the detriment of investors. The deceptive practice of inducing investors in the stock market to make decisions on the basis of false information is called securities fraud, and it is broadly prohibited by federal and state laws.
Our Practice
Handley Farah & Anderson represents victims of securities fraud in individual and class actions to recover losses suffered from companies’ deceptive conduct. Our experienced attorneys have sued some of the largest corporations in the world for making dishonest and misleading statements and have succeeded in recovering hundreds of millions of dollars for individual investors, pension funds, mutual funds and other institutional investors. Cases brought by our lawyers have also reformed the internal controls and structures within publicly traded companies to ensure that such securities fraud does not recur.
Types of Securities Fraud
Securities fraud can take many forms. Some of the most common forms include:
- False Statement: When a corporation or its executives make a misleading statement that affects a stock price. A misleading statement can be either an affirmative misrepresentation or the omission of a material fact.
- Insider Trading: When a corporation or its executives rely on non-public information to execute stocks trades that affect prices.
- Ponzi or Pyramid Schemes: When a company generates returns for older investors by merely acquiring monies from new investors.