Articles Posted in Firm News

Banks Law Office continues to express reservations about the new advertising rules for Reg D Private Placements. “The majority of our investor clients over the last few years have been people who purchased private placements on the advice of a financial advisor,” said Banks. “While there may be a small place for private placements in…

Claimants lawyers and investors everywhere are celebrating a new FINRA rule that was approved yesterday by the SEC. This rule, which will become effective on September 30th, makes an all-public panel the default option for choosing the three arbitrators deciding cases involving a claim of $100,000 or more. Robert Banks was the chair of the…

Every year we receive dozens of calls from investors who have lost money in scams that involve unregistered products and brokers. Your options for recovery are minimal when a product or an adviser isn’t registered. This video posted in May warns investors of some such products.

FINRA has issued a Regulatory Notice advising brokers to be careful about the language they use when selling IRAs to investors. Specifically, FINRA discusses describing IRA accounts as “free” or sold at “no fee”. The communications of brokers and their employers must be fair, balanced, and complete, with no omissions of material information that would…

High-profile securities fraudsters are often repeat offenders. The 71-year-old square-jawed former Oregon candidate for governor, Craig Berkman, recently pled guilty in a New York courtroom to one count of securities fraud and one count of wire fraud. This all relates to a scam that targeted investors eager to make early purchases of Facebook stock when…

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau and the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation have published a free 53-page educational guide for seniors and their caregivers: Money Smart for Older Adults. The guide discusses an array of financial exploitation of seniors, from telephone scams to Ponzi schemes, and provides a glossary and contact information for further guidance. Basic…

As a broad category, Real Estate Investment Trusts (REITs) may be losing attractiveness as an investment, according to market analysts who suggest they’ve been “fully valued at least” and “in the late innings”. REITs tend to be sensitive to interest rates, are less appealing than the available alternatives in an improving market, and are pressured…

June 15, 2013 is the annual World Elder Abuse Awareness Day, as designated by the United Nations. “The day aims to focus global attention on the problem of physical, emotional, and financial abuse of elders. It also seeks to understand the challenges and opportunities presented by an aging population, and brings together senior citizens, and…

Yesterday, June 11, 2013, Oregon Governor John Kitzhaber signed a bill that lengthens the list of people who are legally required to report elder abuse to authorities. House Bill 2205 makes dentists, optometrists, chiropractors, attorneys, and lawmakers themselves mandatory reporters of the abuse of anyone over the age of 65. The mandate includes reporting of…

What’s a Variable Annuity? Basically a variable annuity is a life insurance contract, a wager on the life expectancy of a person. That person is the “annuitant” for purposes of the contract. The person who holds the contract is “the owner.” They’re not necessarily the same person. In return for an investment of an initial…