Spam American Share Offers

wadewade

There have been a couple of threads about these recently. One of these helpfully contained a link to the United States Securities and Exchange Commission in Washington. This in turn gave an email address where you could forward Spam share offers for investigation.

As I get between 12 and 18 of these messages per week I tried forwarding them to the SEC. I have now received a standard reply from them (extract below) so other people might like to forward any shares Spam they receive as well. If enough people do this the SEC might take some notice. Just forward any Spam emails to enforcement@sec.gov

Here's part of the reply they send out:

Dear Sir or Madam:
Thank you for your recent e-mail to the group electronic mailbox of the Division of Enforcement at the United States Securities and Exchange Commission in Washington, D.C. We appreciate your taking the time to write to us. This automated response confirms that the Division of Enforcement has received your e-mail. You can rest assured that an attorney in the Office of Internet Enforcement will review your e-mail promptly.

We are always interested in hearing from members of the public, and you may be assured that the matter you have raised is being given careful consideration in view of the Commission's overall enforcement responsibilities under the federal securities laws. It is, however, the Commission's policy to conduct its inquiries on a confidential basis -- so this may be the only response that you receive.

TNG

I'm getting increasingly annoyed with this. It started out as one or two but I've just deleted another half dozen from my inbox

Now I know what to do with them - thanks!

MickKnipfler

You mean like this?:

The accumulation of positions by those in the know has shot
A_U_N_I up 33% in a few short days. We hope you all got in
early like we told you to, and are enjoying your good fortune.
But even if you didn't don't worry because the big announcement
has yet to be made. Monday, October 30 may be your last chance
before this thing triples. Don't hesitate.

Price: O.85
Projected: 2.3O
Rating: 5/5

This is the break you've been waiting for! Spice up your
holdings with A_U_N_I and WIN!




What are they trying to achieve?

wadewade

They create a shell company that usually has no present assets but great future prospects (oilwells, etc) and buy themselves millions of shares for next to nothing.

Then they hype the shares to mugs with these emails.

As people buy the share price goes up. Then they sell their holdings and disappear overnight. Mugs finish up with shares of no value.

TNG

MickKnipfler wrote:

What are they trying to achieve?

If enough people fall for it and buy shares, the price will go up, meaning the perpetrators can then dump theirs at a profit. With the price so small, even a minor shift upwards can reap huge dividends for those who have bought a large quantity

'Pump and dump' I believe it's referred to as

edit : d'oh - cross posted

MickKnipfler

'Pump and dump' I believe it's referred to as

I think I did that to a girl once....

buglawton

Spam filters will miss these as the spam message is in an image. There's a thread on fighting this kind of spam at http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showthread.html?p=3331679#post3331679 but no easy answer yet.

wadewade

That's why I think it would be a good idea for as many people as possible to forward such spam emails to the SEC (see above). If they can see the extent of the problem they might be more inclined to act.

buglawton

2 thoughts occurred:
1. It must be a doddle to find out who is doing the fraud as all share transactions are monitored in microscopic detail by the SEC.
2. Maybe you can make money by buying a large portfolio of penny shares, reading the spam emails and doing the exact opposite of what they recommend (ie sell when they suggest buy, as the message will be just prior to a DUMP as in pump'n'dump).

LULUBELLE_2

MickKnipfler wrote:

'Pump and dump' I believe it's referred to as

I think I did that to a girl once....

It was you!!! You have a son that wants to contact you.......................:rotfl: :rotfl: :rotfl:

MickKnipfler

LULUBELLE wrote:

It was you!!! You have a son that wants to contact you.......................:rotfl: :rotfl: :rotfl:

You're not that girl that nicknamed me "Justin" are you?