This item is part of Stockwatch's value added news feed and is only available to Stockwatch subscribers.

Here is a sample of this item:

by Mike Caswell

The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission and the U.S. Department of Justice have filed charges against activist short publisher Andrew Left and his company, Citron Capital LLC, citing Mr. Left for a two-year scheme involving multiple stocks in Canada and the United States. The SEC claims that Mr. Left generated $20-million by trading against his own stock recommendations. (All figures are in U.S. dollars.) He allegedly bragged to an associate about his scheme, saying "I save tweets for easy money."

The charges against Mr. Left are contained in a civil complaint and an indictment that the SEC and DOJ filed in federal court in Los Angeles on Friday, July 26. The criminal charges against Mr. Left, 54, are one count of engaging in a securities fraud scheme, 17 counts of securities fraud and one count of making false statements to federal investigators. The charges carry a maximum sentence of 25 years.

In filing the case, the SEC cites Mr. Left for misuse of his investment platform, Citron Research. The firm commands a large following, with more than 100,000 followers on Twitter alone, according to the SEC. Citron purported to expose negative information on public companies, frequently urging readers to sell. As part of his scheme, Mr. Left held Citron out as an independent publication, posting purported "investor letters" to give the impression that he ran a successful hedge fund, the SEC says. In reality, Mr. Left's supposed hedge fund had no outside investors, and he simply used Citron as a vehicle to trade his own money, the SEC claims.

The remainder is available to Stockwatch subscribers.
Sign-up for a FREE 30-day Stockwatch subscription and SEE NO ADS