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COWI is an insolvent pump and dump and in a death spiral. That is how death spiral convertibles KILL every company that issues them.
COWI can't even afford a cup of coffee, much less issue many, if any, news releases any more. They can't afford to do anything, and certainly not "change the world" with whatever fake technology they claim to have.
2021 was the beginning of this 4th pump and dump. Not many stupid people left to believe any of Lloyd's BS anymore.
How is that spin-off coming? Where is the S-1 Lloyd promised a year ago? Will COWI even file anything with the SEC from this point forward? Filing ain't free.
The end is near.
Complete bullshit. You have posted that many times before, and it has never happened.
The toxic death spiral convertible holders have tens of billions of shares to dump RIGHT NOW. All they need is more idiots to buy the worthless shares from them.
There are not enough stupid people in the world to do that.
Not factual. No one is doing that because...they can't! The bid and ask is controlled by the toxic funders. Great on paper, impossible in the real world.
Plenty of social media posts elsewhere on the internet of holders bitching that they can't buy at the bid and sell at the offer. They are stuck.
That is how penny stocks REALLY WORK.
Anyone buying shares of an obvious pump and dump is far from a genius.
It makes me wonder how these people were able to earn the money they are throwing away on these worthless shares in the first place.
Dilution, dilution, dilution. Just because stupid people are ignoring the obvious and still buying this worthless POS doesn't mean anything.
Except that some people are stupid, of course.
Hacking the SEC is not a good idea. Someone just kicked the hornet's nest.
Bitcoin spikes to $48k on back of FAKE tweet from SEC stating the crypto ETFs had been approved - but drops to low of day after hack emerges
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/yourmoney/article-12943595/bitcoin-spike-price-stock-caution.html
Bitcoin surged to almost $48,000 on Tuesday after a fake tweet from the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) said it had approved spot-Bitcoin exchange traded funds.
The false tweet, published on X at 4.11pm, came from the SEC's official account and read: 'Today the SEC grants approval for #Bitcoin ETFs for listing on all registered national securities exchanges.'
Fifteen minutes later the SEC's chief Gary Gensler tweeted from his own account: 'The @SECGov account was compromised, and an unauthorized tweet was posted. The SEC has not approved the listing and trading of spot bitcoin exchange-traded products.'
After the false tweet the token momentarily jumped to its highest level since around March 2022. Its all time high of just under $70,000 was in November 2021.
Shortly after the second tweet from Gensler on Tuesday early evening its price retreated to under $46,000 and just below where it had been hovering for much of the day.
Questions were immediately raised about who was behind such a 'compromise' and who would benefit.
Gensler's tweet was flooded with responses with other X users questioning how the US financial regulator could have such poor security on its social media channels, especially given its tweets can dramatically move markets.
It is possible that the account was hacked it in a bid to push up the price. Experts have suggested if coins were sold on the spike significant profit could be made.
Accounts for X are typically protected by a password and so-called two factor authentication, which requires an additional code sent to a cell phone or email address.
But experts point out hackers can get round these - either by accessing the phone or email, or getting leverage via blackmail over someone who has access.
Bitcoin had jumped almost 10 percent on Monday to above $47,000 as investors grew increasingly optimistic the SEC will approve a spot Bitcoin ETF.
It comes as regulators face a deadline on Wednesday to approve one of around 10 pending applications from asset managers for a Bitcoin ETF - a fund that would behave like a stock and roughly follow the value of the cryptocurrency.
Head of financial research at Standard Chartered Bank, Geoffrey Kendrick, told investors in a note this week that approval was imminent and 'most likely' to happen on January 10.
Should the approval occur, he predicted bitcoin could reach $200,000 by the end of 2025.
'We see this as a watershed moment for normalizing bitcoin participation by institutional money, and we expect approval to drive significant inflows and price upside for BTC,' wrote Kendrick.
Standard Chartered also predicted that between $50 billion and $100 billion will be invested into US spot bitcoin ETFs by the end of this year.
To justify the position that ETF approval will result in a significant influx of cash into bitcoin, Kendrick referred to investments in gold after the approval of a gold ETF in 2004.
Within ten years the price of an ounce increased by more than four, he pointed out in the note.
'We use this 4.3 times price increase as our base case for bitcoin, but we expect the BTC gains to occur during a shorter one- to two-year period because we expect the BTC ETF market to mature more quickly.'
But Gilles Ubaghs, strategic advisor in commercial banking and payments at Datos Insights, told DailyMail.com last year that investors should exercise caution.
Ubaghs noted that bitcoin was not especially valuable as an actual currency and questioned its long-term ability to hold value.
'It's convoluted, difficult to spend and cash out, [has] a sketchy reputation, and most importantly it's so volatile,' he said.
Nonetheless, he acknowledged that although it has limited practical utility for making payments, it does function as a 'digital asset' that can hold value similar to gold or fine wines.
'Ultimately, as much as bitcoin is a pretty weak payment tool - its also unlikely to die anytime soon,' wrote Ubagh.
Currently, it is an END STAGE pump and dump because they can no longer find enough stupid people to buy the shares the toxic death spiral convertible holders want to dump. COWI is also completely insolvent, and now is even in debt to their former subsidiary because they needed to borrow money to keep the lights on and file the last 10-K.
This is exactly what happened the first 3 times Lloyd pump and dumped this ticker. Eventually they just run out of suckers and volume disappears. So, Lloyd goes dark, becomes incommunicado, and disappears. Later, he finds some other new market fad to jump on and pretends COWI is involved to pump the stock for a new round of greedy investors foolish enough to not do any DD and believe him.
Often, a split that big would be a prelude to going private, but it doesn't look like it in this case.
Under the Plan, the creditors received all those shares of new stock which explains the over 108 billion O/S. They kept the old shareholders intact and owning 1/10 of 1% of the new company because they didn't want to lose the liquidity that public companies have. Many major debt investors are not long-term equity holders. The creditors probably want a way to eventually offload their shares, and the public markets is the best way to do that. Even though they were delisted from the NYSE in the bankruptcy, they could apply to relist later, and they don't have to go through the SEC registration process again. I haven't looked at the company in detail, but they have over $2 billion in annual revenue, so they probably want to stay public.
American Airlines Group did something similar when they went through bankruptcy. Creditors ended up the vast majority of the stock, but giving the old shareholders a tiny amount of the reorganized company allowed them to keep their listing and registration intact. Venator probably could have stayed listed on the NYSE if they were quicker in completing the bankruptcy, but bankruptcies of foreign companies are almost always take longer.
Of course, I could be wrong, but if they were going private soon, they would have had to disclose that in the filings for both the Bankruptcy Court and the SEC, and I don't see that they did.
COWI is a pump and dump to enrich the insiders (Lloyd) and the toxic death spiral convertible lenders. Nothing more.
Their pump is quickly running out of steam. Nothing Lloyd has touted has come true, and people foolish enough to believe him and buy this POS are finally discovering they were lied to.
Considering this is Lloyd's FOURTH pump and dump on this ticker, one has to ask why didn't they discover the facts of the situation BEFORE they bought the stock and became bagholders of this worthless POS.
I expect the Feds know exactly where Dozy is, and now that criminal charges have been filed, they will work with the foreign government to grab him and extradite him ASAP.
The other members of management and the Board have are not innocent here. I would like to see the SEC move on them soon, too. Many of them, especially Denos, also signed false certifications.
No, there isn't ANY auditing involved whatsoever. These are non-SEC registered penny stocks. Frankly, no one should believe ANYTHING a non-SEC registered company says. NOTHING.
If someone does, they are a fool and an idiot.
There is no auditing involved. He just prepared the financial statements on behalf of the management.
You would be surprised how many companies, large and small, outsource their financial statement preparation. Very few CFO's actually do it these days. It is very common to outsource for a number of reasons.
If you followed the link, you see that he is not identified as a CPA on the OTCMarkets disclosure.
So no professional violation there.
There you go. Being banned by the SEC has no effect on his ability to provide services to non-SEC registered OTC companies.
It should, but as we know, OTCMarkets doesn't want to upset their paying customers and really cares nothing for the investing public. They just don't count.
OTCMarkets could always "ban" them from being a provider, but that is pretty meaningless. They have no enforcement power, and it really just means a company doesn't put their name in their disclosure submitted to OTCMarket's website. A lot of sleazy OTC companies utilize banned and/or convicted fraudsters for services. They just keep it on the down low.
Now, if they were an SEC registrant employing an individual prohibited from practicing in front of the SEC (which includes CPA's and other financial reporting professionals), that is a different matter. That is actually a law, and the SEC's enforcement powers and penalties are real.
But, a number of SEC prohibited individuals continue to provide professional services to OTC companies as long as they are not SEC registrants. It shouldn't work that way, but does.
"So, is it legal for a CPA to be a CPA for a penny stock while his CPA licenses is revoked?"
Yes.
CPA is only a designation. You don't need to be a CPA to provide accounting or financial reporting services to any company, even SEC reporting ones.
Of course, having a revoked CPA involved with ANY company is a massive red flag........
Forbes presents "Attack of the Naked Short Sellers"!
It is hilarious. And pretty much 100% true about how the MMTLP mess went down.
https://www.forbes.com/sites/brandonkochkodin/2023/12/27/attack-of-the-naked-short-sellers-mythical-beasts-of-the-night-or-how-meme-stock-investors-went-cult-y/
Common shares are being cancelled under the final bankruptcy plan. Common shareholders will receive nothing.
"On the Effective Date, each Existing Equity Interest, shall be cancelled, extinguished, and discharged, subject to applicable law, and each holder thereof shall not receive or retain any property under this Plan on account of such Existing Equity Interest."
I haven't had a chance to read it yet, but I do remember the story and Mitts. IIRC, some of the shorters being investigated named him in their public responses over the Spring and Summer when the mainstream media picked up on the story, but I haven't heard much of anything since.
I am not convinced the SEC took what he did at face value, or that his research directly led to the SEC's investigation. His supporters insinuate they did, but I am skeptical. I believe the basis of his claims of "short and distort" is that there is a lot of volume in short-term, out -of-the-money option contracts in stocks that are covered by the short sellers. But what is missing that trading in such contacts has exploded in ALL stocks due to meme players. They are regularly buying and selling such contracts because they are low-priced and short-term in nature. If it were only in the stocks immediately before the short sellers issue a report, that would be one thing. But it isn't that at all.
I haven't seen anything recently that has changed my opinion that what the SEC is looking at is NOT "short and distort", which includes these short sellers issuing known falsehoods to manipulate stocks, but instead that the short sellers are somehow sharing information with others prior to the release of the reports. It isn't stock manipulation as the anti-short selling cabal claims, but instead is about insider information. A completely different thing, but likely illegal, just as if a long analyst tipped others prior to the public release of a bullish report. I don't know if the SEC is even considering that the short sellers are issuing false reports at all. Where I sit, it seems the short sellers' reports are factual (the market doesn't always listen, but that doesn't change the confirmation of the facts), and their batting average is at least as good, if not better, than many of the established long analysts these days.
TIO's Dozy speaks! (supposedly)
Dozy supposedly issued a statement this morning. But I can't find the statement itself, just references to it in various African media outlets. That makes me believe that Dozy or his people E-mailed a statement to only friendly African outlets, many of which are already covering for him.
Here is one of them (one of the least crazy ones):
https://www.legit.ng/business-economy/money/1570133-after-days-waiting-nigerian-billionaire-accused-fraud-finally-speaks-out/
Yup, from jail!
Oh, wait a minute........
I believe this is Tingo's paid PR firm.
https://www.mzgroup.us/
They are just one of the many providers that are likely to get a nasty black eye from the Tingo scam. But unlike some others, I doubt the PR firm will end up coughing up any cash in potential lawsuits.
I believe Tingo has a paid PR company under contract that writes their releases, and that release smacks of professional CYA.
And how long before Dozy is behind bars? Not long, I bet. I would not be surprised if he has already been indicted in the US, but it remains sealed until they can arrange with whatever foreign nation he is currently in (UK?) to get him on US soil and place him into custody.
This time may very well be the last time, as I think it likely that there are criminal charges coming for Christopher here.
And his cousin is the current Home Secretary.
https://www.gov.uk/government/people/james-cleverly
He is likely trading on the family connection.
Dividends do not have to come from current profits, or even from current cash flow. But, by law, they must come from capital which is surplus to the company's total liabilities. In other words, assets which belong to the shareholders, not to debtors or creditors. (in very rare cases, companies have declared dividends based on asset values which are not reflected on the balance sheet, but typically they only do so after independent, legitimate third party valuations have been done and court cases brought by the debtholders have been resolved. It usually involves significantly appreciated, and liquid, real estate holdings, so the number of companies that have done that can probably be counted on one hand with a couple fingers left over).
For Epix, if the Hindenburg research is correct, they may have had no actual shareholder's equity to legally pay dividends from. All the company's actual assets may have belonged to the debtors, and then perhaps some to the creditors. They filed bankruptcy because they couldn't repay their massive amount of debt, and the early valuation of the assets is looking bleak for the debtors recovering all they are owed, much less the creditors. If that turns out to be the case, and it is certainly looking that way, then company almost certainly paid dividends they were not legally allowed to pay.
I would not be surprised in the least if it turns out they were paying that small dividend from their debt and not actual positive cash flow, much less earnings.
If so, that is almost certainly an illegal act. Shareholders can only receive assets that are rightfully and legally theirs. In this case, shareholders may actually own nothing.
I doubt it a a full-on scam like Tingo, but the financial allegations are still of a serious nature and, if even somewhat true, definitely would have contributed to the bankruptcy. It looks and smells a lot like Tingo in many respects, particularly in the financial reporting being controlled by one person, as that screams fraud.
From the original June 2022 Hindenburg report:
The top customer reported just $151,000 in sales in its most recent financials (2020) but has supposedly accounted for $46 million in revenue to EbixCash in FY 2021. We visited its official corporate address and found it was no longer in use. The entity’s key product was an app with only 1000+ downloads and 5 reviews, the last of which was 2018.
The second customer accounted for $43 million in revenue to EbixCash in FY 2021. Despite claiming in corporate filings that 99% of its revenue is derived from e-commerce, its website no longer works. The entity is registered to a 525 sq. foot office space in Delhi. We visited the site and found the business is no longer there.
EbixCash also claims to have a large retail distribution network. We visited the featured branch outlet highlighted in an EbixCash corporate presentation and found it doesn’t exist at the address. The picture of the branch seems to be obviously photoshopped to include an Ebix storefront where there isn’t one.
EbixCash’s subsidiary lists 970 supposed EbixCash independent distributors. We called every one of them: 403 didn’t pick up, 527 told us they didn’t sell Ebix cards, and 40 (~7% of those who picked up) told us they sold the cards. Many who sold the cards told us they were selling fewer now than prior to the pandemic, contrary to Ebix’s claims.
EbixCash also touts its technology offering, claiming its app has 1.5 million downloads. The Google Play store shows “100,000+” downloads with an average review of 1.5 stars across 2,400+ reviews. The ocean of 1-star reviews cite complaints such as money being fraudulently stolen from users, terrible customer service, and the app not working.
We also tested the app. Virtually every claimed feature didn’t work. An EbixCash rep told us the app was “under maintenance”. Based on our experience, the app isn’t even ready for the market let alone a prime-time IPO.
Ebix has a complicated corporate structure, reporting 69 key subsidiaries in 2021, with other sub-entities. In 2021, ~37% of its pre-tax income was derived from murky, opaque tax havens like Dubai and Mauritius. Given our findings on gift card revenue, we suspect there are other accounting skeletons in its closet.
Ebix has cycled through 7 different auditors since 2004, a classic hallmark of accounting irregularities. Its current auditor, KG Somani, is an Indian firm whose only U.S.-listed client is Ebix, per Public Company Accounting Oversight Board (PCAOB) records.
As a former executive of EbixCash told us, “The financial reporting was a very controlled thing. It’s very difficult for anybody running the company to have much visibility on the financial side. It’s very centrally controlled by (Chairman & CEO) Robin (Raina) and his close team. They’ve been working with him for a very very long time.”
We think a substantial portion of EbixCash’s gift card revenue is non-existent. Consequently, we expect the EbixCash IPO will flop or fail. Given Ebix’s massive near-term debt load in a rising rate environment, we see significant solvency risk over the next 12 months.
The Ebix bankruptcy will be interesting, as it might uncover some of the issues that Hindenburg wrote about.
Their auditor is a smaller firm in India, and they were just sanctioned by the PCAOB in August of this year for some pretty serious violations. The types of violations that could easy allow fraudulent revenues and assets to slip through.
https://pcaobus.org/news-events/news-releases/news-release-detail/pcaob-sanctions-k-g-somani-co-llp-engagement-partner-for-violations-of-audit-quality-control-standards
2 wins for Hindenburg today.
"Ebix Files Bankruptcy After Short-Seller Attacks, Debt Woes"
"Short seller Hindenburg Research previously accused Ebix of fabricating some of its revenue, including a substantial portion of revenue in its gift card business — an accusation the company denied."
They won the wrong award!
Tingo also received nominations in four other award categories, including Best Company in Food Security, Poverty Reduction, Stakeholder Engagement, and Use of Storytelling/Communications.
I demand a recount!
That is disappointing. 4 years is a ridiculously light sentence.
The judiciary in the United States continues to under-punish financial crimes. Especially when it comes to those that rip-off huge numbers of individual investors.
Updated Link to SEC Tingo's complaint
https://www.sec.gov/files/litigation/complaints/2023/comp25913.pdf
25912 became 25913
Good question. NASDAQ could have already delisted the stock a long time ago, which was SOP in many other past cases of SEC suspension and suspected fraud. But, in this case, they haven't. By keeping them listed, but suspended, it prevents Tingo from trading anywhere. That may be the SEC and NASDAQ's new tactic in these cases. Since the alleged mastermind of the fraud controls most of the stock, and has been secretly pumping and dumping for years, they probably want to deny him any opportunity to continue to sell shares.
Tingo, assuming they have any actual management or directors left, could apply to voluntarily delist from NASDAQ, but that hasn't happened, either. Even if they do that and go OTC, they would just be expert market.
Hindenburg is widely mentioned in the compliant as "Analyst A".
The full SEC complaint against Tingo holds numerous gems. One is of particular interest to anyone that follows scams and SEC suspension. How often do we hear from pumpers and longs of suspended companies that the SEC recklessly suspends without any investigation, or the investigation begins only when the SEC suspends the stock? Or, even better, the 10 day suspension will allow the SEC to "give the company a clean bill of health" and it will quickly return to trading better than before.
Yeah, about that.
Hindenburg published their report on Tingo on June 6. The SEC suspension of Tingo was on November 13th. The SEC investigation actually began concurrent with the Hindenburg report. Hindenburg says they provide the regulators with the info before they publish, so it is certainly possible the SEC investigation began then, too. The complaint states:
"SEC staff issued multiple investigative subpoenas to Tingo Group, beginning in June 2023, and an investigative subpoena to Agri-Fintech in August 2023."
So, the next time some pumper claims the SEC doesn't start investigating a suspended company until they first suspend, show them that.
Yes, I sure do.
But hopefully this is just the beginning of the next chapter, not the end. Some prison doors slamming shut on these scammers would be a much more appropriate happy ending!
There is also a lot more to come with Tingo's service providers and Directors. Deloitte as their current auditor is the top of the list. Based on the SEC's complaint, the forged documents were clear and obvious fakes. They should have been caught a long time ago.
SEC Charges Tingo Mobile Founder, Three Companies with Massive Fraud and Seeks Emergency Relief
https://www.sec.gov/litigation/litreleases/lr-25913
The Securities and Exchange Commission today announced charges against Mmobuosi Odogwu Banye a/k/a Dozy Mmobuosi and three affiliated U.S.-based entities of which he is the CEO–Tingo Group Inc., Agri-Fintech Holdings Inc., and Tingo International Holdings Inc.–in connection with an alleged multi-year scheme to inflate the financial performance metrics of these companies and key operating subsidiaries to defraud investors worldwide. The SEC is seeking emergency relief to prevent Defendants’ continued dissemination of materially false information to investors and to protect corporate and investor assets.
The SEC’s complaint, filed on December 18, 2023, alleges that, since at least 2019, Mmobuosi spearheaded a scheme to fabricate financial statements and other documents of the three entities and their Nigerian operating subsidiaries, Tingo Mobile Limited and Tingo Foods PLC. The complaint further alleges that Mmobuosi made and caused the entities to make material misrepresentations about their business operations and financial success in press releases, periodic SEC filings, and other public statements. For instance, Tingo Group’s fiscal year 2022 Form 10-K filed in March 2023 reported a cash and cash equivalent balance of $461.7 million in its subsidiary Tingo Mobile’s Nigerian bank accounts. In reality, those same bank accounts allegedly had a combined balance of less than $50 as of the end of fiscal year 2022. According to the SEC’s complaint, Defendants also fabricated the customer relationships that formed the basis of their purported businesses. The complaint alleges that Mmobuosi and the entities he controls have fraudulently obtained hundreds of millions in money or property through these schemes, and that Mmobuosi has siphoned off funds for his personal benefit, including purchases of luxury cars and travel on private jets, as well as an unsuccessful attempt to acquire an English Football Club Premier League team, among other things.
The SEC’s complaint, filed in U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York, charges all four Defendants with violating the anti-fraud provisions of the federal securities laws and additionally charges Nasdaq-listed Tingo Group, OTC-traded Agri-Fintech, and Mmobuosi with reporting, books and records, and internal controls violations. It also charges Mmobuosi with lying to auditors, insider trading, and failing to file Forms 4 disclosing the sales of millions of Agri-Fintech common stock for which he was the ultimate beneficial owner. The complaint seeks permanent injunctive relief, disgorgement of ill-gotten gains and prejudgment interest, civil penalties, and the return, pursuant to Section 304 of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act, of bonuses and profits obtained by Mmobuosi from sales of Tingo Group or Agri-Fintech stock. The complaint also seeks an order prohibiting Mmobuosi from acting as an officer or director of a public company or from participating in the offering of any penny stock.
As part of the SEC’s emergency application, the SEC seeks an order to show cause and other temporary and preliminary relief against Defendants, including a temporary restraining order: (1) freezing Mmobuosi’s assets; (2) prohibiting TIH, Agri-Fintech and Tingo Group from transferring money or property or issuing shares to Mmobuosi; (3) enjoining Defendants from selling or otherwise disposing of their respective holding in Agri-Fintech and/or Tingo Group stock; (4) prohibiting Defendants and their agents from destroying, altering, or concealing records and documents; and (5) ordering Defendants to show cause why a preliminary injunction continuing the relief set forth in any temporary restraining order as well as ordering repatriation of proceeds and a sworn accounting should not be entered.
The SEC’s ongoing investigation is being conducted by Michael DiBattista, Christopher Mele, David Zetlin-Jones, Jeremy Brandt, Stephen Johnson, Elizabeth Baier, Gerald Gross, and Rebecca Reilly under the supervision of Tejal D. Shah, all of the SEC’s New York Regional Office. The litigation is being led by Mr. Zetlin-Jones, Mr. DiBattista, and Mr. Brandt. The SEC appreciates the assistance of Nasdaq’s Enforcement Department.
No, you are mistaken. ADVFN is up-to-date on their filings. They are traded on AIM, and the filing requirements are different than what you are used to in the USA, including filing every 6 months instead of every quarter.
They recently announced their June 30 year-end financials will be published next week.
"The Company's annual report and accounts for the financial year ended 30 June 2023 are expected to be published in the week commencing 18 December 2023 and will be made available to shareholders via a separate announcement."
https://www.advfn.com/stock-market/london/AFN/stock-news/92729716/advfn-plc-notice-of-agm