[Scene: Elevator of a Wall St. firm. One man alone. Another enters.]

“Good morning.”

“Hello.”

“Say, aren’t you Jim Chanos, the hedge fund titan?”

“Why yes, yes I am.”

“Wow, it’s a pleasure to meet you. I’ve enjoyed following your exploits and your many interviews on CNBC.”

“Thanks, it’s always nice to meet a fan.”

“Now, Mr. Chanos, it’s time for the final reckoning of the bill.”

[2nd man tazes Chanos, then climbs out top of elevator and cuts the cable, a la Jason Bourne. Chanos plunges to his death.]

And so on….

ESCL CSKI EEE TIM SUF BTIM

he works for Kingsford and others crooks

http://www.asensio.com

http://www.pr-inside.com/author-reveals-secrets-that-caused-america-s-r1671789.htm

“WASHINGTON–The chairman of the commission investigating the 2008 financial crisis said Thursday he planned to probe the actions of regulators back to the Clinton Administration, broadening his inquiry beyond bankers.

Former California Treasurer Phil Angelides said in an interview he wanted to know “what did the FBI, the Fed, the Department of Justice and others know about subprime lending; when they know it, and why didn’t they act?”

Mr. Angelides said former Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan and current Chairman Ben Bernanke likely would be called to testify at future commission hearings. He also mentioned former Securities and Exchange Commission heads Christopher Cox, William Donaldson and Arthur Levitt as likely witnesses….”

( http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704281204575002783839802528.html?mod=WSJ_hpp_sections_news )

THE PONZI SCHEME THAT WASN’T

USA Hedge Fund Convinces Spanish Authorities to Close A Spanish Company,

Negatively Impacting 190,000 Spanish Clients as well as

Destroying $900 Million in USA Escala Group’s Shareholder Value

The facts of this case can easily be ascertained, and demonstrate that the Spanish government and the SEC have completely overlooked what may be one of history’s largest cases of both insider trading and blatant share price manipulation via the illegal naked shorting of a NASDAQ-listed company and the hedge fund-instigated closure of its parent company in Spain.

My name is Maria de los Milagros (Mila) Hernán Alvarez, and I am a resident of Madrid, Spain. I am writing this exposé to advise your readers of the true circumstances involving a USA based hedge fund’s successful attempt to destroy a respected Spanish company, thereby manipulating the share price of then-NASDAQ listed Escala Group (ESCL) sharply downward.

On May 9, 2006, 300 riot police shut down Afinsa Bienes Tangibles’ headquarters building in Madrid. The prosecutor’s allegations were that Afinsa was a massive Ponzi scheme. Today, more than 3½ years later, no tangible proof of any wrongdoing has been provided by the prosecutor, and not one trial of any Afinsa executive has taken place. In fact, after a year-plus worldwide search the prosecutor found no illegal offshore monies and, contrary to what the prosecutor anticipated, found every client’s investment account to be intact in the company’s massive walk-in vaults. In addition, Afinsa had honored every commitment to all of its clients, including my family.

Unlike any Ponzi operation, throughout its 26-year history Afinsa’s financial statements were fully available to the public per Spanish regulations. Over this long period of time Afinsa built the world’s largest orderly philatelic marketplace, both buying and selling worldwide stamps to investors. The main charge of the Spanish prosecutor was that Afinsa operated as a financial company and not mercantile as Afinsa claimed. This charge was recently overturned by the government itself, by the Consejo de Estado and Banco de España’s own admission. Only the judge and prosecutor are still trying this charge, despite the fact that other government officials have disavowed it.

According to Neil Martin, a Barron’s writer, Afinsa’s closure was precipitated by a hedge fund’s (Georgia-based Kingsford Capital) complaints to the Spanish government in September of 2005. In a May 2005 Barron’s article authored by Martin, he openly admits to working with and being partially financed by a hedge fund short Escala shares since the previous summer. It was apparent in 2005, despite Martin’s frequent and incredibly slanted Barron’s articles against Escala, as well as his collaboration with other reporters to further his campaign, that accurate independent analysis and the company’s positive results were overcoming the dirty campaign orchestrated by Martin and Louis Corrigan of Kingsford Capital.

Therefore, if a way to knock down Escala’s share price was not found soon, it was apparent that many millions of dollars would be lost by those shorting Escala stock, both legally and illegally. Afinsa was the majority owner (69%) of Escala and their largest client, a perfect target to launch a smear campaign against. Brazenly, with this as seemingly a last resort, Corrigan submitted his fallacious complaint against Afinsa and struck it rich. Despite the fact that Afinsa had 1.1 billion Euros in equity written to market beyond the clients’ stamp portfolio values, the prosecutor apparently acted on Corrigan’s complaint and put tens of thousands of clients into total limbo, as well as causing 3,500 Afinsa workers to lose their employment.

Far from being a Ponzi scheme, Afinsa’s exact stamp-related business model is currently in place at Stanley Gibbons, a well respected 150-plus year old company based in England. No one has called Stanley Gibbons a Ponzi scheme. In addition, after due diligence in March of 2006, Citigroup’s investment banking office in Spain made a presentation to Afinsa for an IPO, valuing the company in excess of 1.2 billion Euros if Afinsa were to go public. As another result of the closure, the founders of Afinsa are suing the Spanish government for 1.4 billion Euros.

To date, the SEC has apparently done nothing to investigate the massive, tens of millions of shares of Escala stock traded illegally in May and December of 2006. Nor has any apparent effort been made to investigate the extreme likelihood of equally massive insider trading if the “complaining” hedge funds had insider knowledge of the Spanish prosecutor’s plan to close down Afinsa.

The complete facts of this unprecedented story can be viewed at the website http://www.gregmanning.me A copy of the Kingsford Capital complaint against Afinsa is present on that website as Exhibit 4, as well as Exhibit A, an independent research report on the massive share price manipulation which includes DTC records and proof of the significant illegal trading.

Here in Spain I am leading a petition drive to have the European Union put pressure on the president of Spain, José Luis Rodriguez Zapatero, to address the crisis situation created by the government for 190,000 persons. I would welcome anyone who sympathizes with our plight to sign the international petition at http://www.gopetition.com/online/32742.html. Thank you for your assistance.

Based on my research and after reviewing the Deep Capture website, the attacks against Escala and Afinsa were the same modus operandi used against many, many companies. The difference in this case is that not only shareholders, but 190,000 additional innocent victims have lost all or part of their life savings. It’s time that the SEC takes action on behalf of undoubtedly millions of victims of illegal share price manipulation of all the companies affected by these well-planned corporate terror campaigns.

Sincerely,

Mila Hernán Alvarez

Here is part of the 2010 version of how insane it is to use margin accounts.

WALL STREET VERSUS MAIN STREET AND THE USE OF MARGIN ACCOUNTS

Let’s assume “Buyer Bob B.” has $10,000 to invest and he wants to buy shares of Acme Pharmaceutical which has a new cancer cure. Bob is an immunologist and very familiar with the efficacy of Acme’s new breakthrough drug. Bob places an order for $10,000 worth of Acme and his broker informs him that he could actually buy $20,000 worth of Acme if he would just open up a margin account. Bob may not be able to afford to lose $20,000 half of which is borrowed but knowing of the potential for the new drug he takes the bait and opens up a margin a/c and buys $20,000 worth of Acme. Bob can afford to buy “X” amount of Acme but he ends up buying “2X” worth but it was his choice. After all, to an immunologist like Bob Acme’s chances for an FDA approval is a no-brainer.

Bob’s brokerage firm’s clearing firm earns a fee for the “banking” business it provided to Bob and the full “2X” amount of shares serves as the collateral for that $10,000 loan. Bob’s brokerage firm incurs veritably no risk for default on this loan with 200% collateral because they can easily sell these shares out from underneath Bob should the price drop. Let’s assume that the shares that Bob bought were short sold from a short seller. This “2X” amount of shares were originally bought by an investor across town named “Buyer Bob A.” They too were bought in a margin a/c; that’s why they were available for lending to the short seller.

After processing Bob B.’s $20,000 purchase order his broker now becomes the “legal owner” of that particular parcel of 2X amount of shares unknowingly “co-beneficially owned” by Bob A. and Bob B. Being the new “legal owner” of that 2X parcel of Acme shares Bob B.’s broker has all of the right in the world to rent them to yet another short seller who then sells them to yet another Bob, “Buyer Bob C.” There are now 3 “co-beneficial owners” of that one parcel of impossible to identify shares. The most recent purchaser is referred to as the “legal owner” and all previous purchasers of that same parcel of shares are referred to as “security entitlement holders”. This parcel of shares is impossible to identify because of the NSCC’s insistence on holding “street name” shares in an “anonymously pooled” format and because of the circa 1970 “dematerialization” of tough to counterfeit paper-certificated shares into easy to counterfeit electronic book entry shares.

The new “legal owner” receives the right to vote these shares as voting rights are directly tied to “legal ownership”. The 11 “security entitlement holders” lost their voting rights but they don’t know this because they’re impossible to identify and inform. Isn’t that fortunate! During any voting procedure the clearing firm will typically and invisibly shave down voting rights on a pro-rata basis to help cover up these frauds and cover up the existence of their hiding FTDs in “ex-clearing arrangements”. One must recall that a mere “security entitlement” has none of the rights that this “package of rights” known as a “share” has. Every time the purchaser of nonexistent shares (a “security entitlement holder”) whose shares remain undelivered tries to exercise one of the approximately 12 rights attached only to legitimate registered shares a cover up fraud needs to be perpetrated to cover up the disparity between legitimate “shares outstanding” and the arithmetic sum of “shares outstanding” and “security entitlements held”.

Non-prosecution Agreements — Formal written agreements, entered into under limited and appropriate circumstances, in which the Commission agrees not to pursue an enforcement action against a cooperator if the individual or company agrees, among other things, to cooperate fully and truthfully and comply with express undertakings

http://www.sec.gov/news/press/2010/2010-6.htm

I some how see a quick round of ‘I did it but they made me do it’ that will end up pinning the blame on the small investor if they can.

How stupid do they think we are? Before they even start around the mullberry bush with this one I see where they will try to take it.

I hate to say this but we need to take a lesson from China. Traitors are those who use their political position for personal gain at the expense of those they are sworn to serve and should be charged and prosecuted as such.