Alternatively, Lips and Warras told investors that Malom would secure funding through transactions involving H-series Brazilian Letras do Tesouro Nacional (“LTNs”) – bonds issued by the Brazilian government in 1972 that were purportedly worth in excess of US$200 million.
62. These LTNs, however, are worthless.
63. Well before Malom began telling investors it would repay them with these bonds and continuing until the present, the Brazilian National Treasury has hosted an English-language website unequivocally warning investors that “[a]ll LTN’s issued in the seventies, in printed versions, had lost their value and are no longer valid,” that “[a]ny documents about rescheduling these papers are an imitation intended to be passed off fraudulently or deceptively as genuine,” and that “[a] number of law firms have generated negative outcomes for its clients, offering deals, presenting false evidences, with calculations attaching high values to those bonds.”
64. To assuage investors’ concerns about this and other warnings, Malom, using investor funds, paid Campos e Campos Advogados, a Brazilian law firm, and one of its partners to acquire LTNs and to obtain a legal opinion and official documents explaining why and how the LTNs were valid and had value.
Case 2:13-cv-02280 Document 1 Filed 12/16/13
65. Some of the documents provided to Malom by the Brazilian law firm were forgeries, including, for example, a November 19, 2010, “Repac Certificate,” which purports to be a government re-validation of the worthless bonds. Warras, Micelli, and Brandel provided these documents to investors, including to the USA Springs investors, when it became clear that Malom was not going to be able to create a structured note and needed to convince the investors, creditors, and the bankruptcy court that it could still generate promised funding.
Register for free to join our community of investors and share your ideas. You will also get access to streaming quotes, interactive charts, trades, portfolio, live options flow and more tools.