Auction Rate Securities, ARS Fraud Lawyer
Williams Kherkher - ARS Attorneys Who Can Help
In the beginning of 2008, an entire $300 billion market collapsed. Individual investors were told they couldn't access their funds and were worried they would not be able to recover their investments. As of the beginning of March 2008, only one of the issuer of these Auction-Rate Securities (ARS) had announced plans to buy back the auction-rate debt.
Auction-rate securities are long-term bonds that act like short-term debt. They can be municipal bonds, corporate bonds, or preferred stocks that can be issued by municipalities, tax-exempt institutions, and closed-end mutual funds. These securities frequently have their interest rate rest via a Dutch auction.
While the investment process is not a problem, it is something of an issue that banks and other firms misrepresented the auction rate securities to investors as safe, liquid, short term "cash equivalents." Basically, they were being marketed like money market funds. In addition, these securities may have been sold to investors even though they were unsuitable for their investment objections.
Now that this has come to light, many people are demanding answers from the banks and investment firms that issued the auction-rate securities. There are now investigations into securities fraud concerning the misrepresentation of the auction-rate securities.
In the past month, the market for auction-rate securities has completely collapsed due to the withdrawal of major broker-dealers. This means that over $350 billion in auction-rate securities that were once "cash equivalents" are now illiquid which has resulted in economic losses and severe hardships for investors.
If you have been unable to liquidate your auction-rate bonds and preferred stocks and feel that your investments were misrepresented by an investment firm,
contact the
auction rate securities fraud lawyers of Williams Kherkher at 1-866-950-9000 to discuss the details of your case and to determine your legal options.