One Step Ahead

[Ignutz]

Is Time Running Short in StockGate Scandal?
by Mark Faulk

For the past eight months, The Faulking Truth has reported on the massive naked short selling scandal that has plagued the stock market for years. It has been called by many "the biggest financial scandal in the history of the world". During that time, dozens of lawsuits have been filed by both companies and stockholders who claim that their companies have been systematically destroyed by the practice of naked short selling. They claim that brokers, through their wholly owned clearing house system, the Depository Trust Corporation (DTCC), have effectively been creating counterfeit shares of stock through their "Stock Borrow Program", which allows brokers to "borrow" the same shares over and over again, artificially inflating the share count and driving the price of the stock down. They also claim that the governing body that has been entrusted with the task of protecting the individual investors, the self-proclaimed "Investor's Advocate", the SEC, has failed to protect investors, and has succumbed to pressure from the brokers who profit from the naked short selling scandal.
The major media has been slow to cover this scandal, and until now, except for a few random articles from publications such as The Wall Street Journal, Forbes Magazine, and Dow Jones Newswire, this story has been left to independent publications such as The Faulking Truth and Financialwire.net. On June 11, in a Faulking Truth exclusive, we reported that NBC's Dateline was planning a major expose on the stock market scandal, filming over 100 hours of interviews and footage while putting together a segment that our inside sources said would "blow the roof off of this scandal". Originally scheduled to air in January or early February, rescheduled for August, and then postponed yet again, many critics and bashers claimed the segment was shelved for good, especially after a case brought by JagMedia, and filed by an attorney in the Houston law firm of O’Quinn, Laminack, and Pirtle, was dismissed earlier this month by Houston Judge Vanessa Gilmore, citing "repeated filing deficiencies". It was fodder for the message boards and the numerous websites that have recently sprung up in an effort to negate the progress made by this publication and others who have continued to report on the scandal. Even those activists who have continually pushed for major stock market reform and a full congressional investigation into the SEC were disheartened by both the lawsuit dismissal and Dateline's refusal to air the segment or even confirm that they were still planning to air it.

Dateline Confirms StockGate Segment

It seems that both concerns are unfounded. One source close to the Dateline story told us this week that the segment would air "in the next two to three weeks", and that there is a "90% chance that it will air before the Presidential election on November 2nd." According to this source, who is heavily involved with the segment, "the Dateline story is imminent". Another source told us that while they would "be surprised if it aired before the election", that the segment was nearing completion.
I've been emailing and calling Dateline for months with no response (not even a courtesy "no comment"), so I decided to try a different approach. I emailed Sharon Hoffman, the producer who is in charge of the stock market scandal segment for Dateline, and phrased my question like this:
Sharon,
I have information that you are planning to air the segment on the stock market scandal "sometime in the next three weeks". My sources, which are extremely credible, have told me that they are "90% certain that it will air before the election on Nov. 2".
As always, I would love to have some kind of confirmation from you that this is accurate. In fact, let me phrase it this way: If you do not respond to this email, I will assume that my information is accurate and that you have no comment on the story I am writing.
Low and behold, Sharon Hoffman sent me this email a couple of hours later:
Mr. Faulk:
Thanks for your email. We are, in fact, still shooting interviews for the story, and it does not yet have a scheduled air date. I will definitely email you to alert you to the air date as soon as I know what it is, since I know you and your readers have a strong interest in the subject.
Regards,
Sharon Hoffman
In answer to my followup question about whether the segment will air before the election, Hoffman told me that "there is a chance we'll air before the election, but also a chance that we won't. I'll let you know when I know."
It's finally "official". The Dateline stock market scandal segment is still on, and our readers will know the scheduled air date as soon as we do. (Thanks, Sharon, we need all the help we can get.)

Lawsuits Still Being Filed

So, what about the JagMedia lawsuit dismissal, and the others still pending? According to our sources at the law firm handling the case, the JagMedia case was filed independently by an associate attorney with O'Quinn, Laminack, and Pirtle, and not by O'Quinn himself, so the attorney didn't have access to the 100 person investigative and research team that O'Quinn and Wes Christian (of Christian, Smith, Wukoson and Jewell) have assembled to put together their cases. In fact, O'Quinn and Christian have a total of 20 cases currently pending, with five more scheduled to be filed in the next thirty days. According to our source, they intend to eventually file a total of 50 to 100 lawsuits involving the naked shorting scandal. In one case, involving Nanopierce, they have won a favorable ruling to have the case tried in state court (instead of federal), and have received "favorable rulings and begun the deposition and discovery process" on another case.
While the O'Quinn/Christian cases have received the most publicity, many others have begun springing up around the country. One, filed by a majority stockholder with Trident Systems, Inc., is suing the DTCC, Knight Securities, ETrade, Morgan Stanley, Waterhouse, Bear Stearns, and Goldman Sachs, claiming that they utilized the "Stock Borrow Program" to defraud stockholders of that company. Another lawsuit has been filed by NanoSignal Corp. shareholder Gary Walters against the DTCC and Knight Securities, claiming that they "shorted 447 million shares of our stock", more than double the total outstanding shares, and have failed to deliver those shares.

States Getting Involved

We have also confirmed that several states have opened investigations into the naked short selling scandal, including Nevada , Washington, California, Florida, and Louisiana. In fact, Louisiana has filed a criminal subpoena against Paine Webber for failure to deliver shares of Nutek, a Las Vegas, Nevada holding company. According to our sources, several other states are considering similar investigations.
This is a story that just won't go away. Judging by the numerous lawsuits already filed, the steady stream still being filed, the state investigations just getting under way across the country, and the publicity certain to follow the Dateline story, this issue is picking up speed. It's just a matter of time before the true facts are revealed. For those who are involved in the massive fraud that's been perpetuated upon the stockholders of America, time is truly running "short".

http://www.faulkingtruth.com/Articles/Investing101/1011.html