Crownfield Capital

lozzy1965

Pretty sure this is a scam, but thought I'd post for others' thoughts.
Got a cold call from these guys about some shares that I owned and had sold. Crownfield told me that the original company had been taken over (which is true) and that I did have some residual shares in the new company. This is possible if I had a scrip dividend outstanding when I sold, but unlikely I think. I sold my original holding well over 10 years ago. Anyway, the gist of the call was that someone wants to make a hostile take over of the company, and wants to buy my shares for well over the market value in order to get 51% of the shares in the company, they currently own 43% of the shares. I have owned shares in companies that have been taken over both with and without the support of the board of directors, but I have never been approached directly for my shares. So that's the big alarm bell for me. They have sent me a non disclosure agreement to fill in (sent to my 'for garbage' email address), which I haven't opened. I suspect this is just a data gathering exercise, possibly asking for bank details as well, to perform some kind of scam. Thoughts any of you clever people?

londoninvestor

lozzy1965 wrote: »

Anyway, the gist of the call was that someone wants to make a hostile take over of the company, and wants to buy my shares for well over the market value in order to get 51% of the shares in the company, they currently own 43% of the shares.

Is it a UK company? If so, I'd think that the acquirer would need to make a public tender offer - so a tale that they're trying to pick off small holdings like this doesn't sound legit.

AnotherJoe

It's a scam. Quite a common one.
If you were gullible enough to proceed, at some point you'd get a request to pay them money for legal or other fees to allow the transaction to proceed before they say they will then send you the money for your shares.
Which obviously will never happen.
Some months later, another company will contact you offering to recover your lost money. For a fee of course.
Edit:note the FOMO aspect of this, since supposedly they only need a few more shares they subtly put pressure on you to go with this since otherwise others may sell theirs and then they won't pay a premium for yours. All pure BS.

Reaper

As I started reading your post I was thinking I'm going to see the phrases "hostile takeover", "above market value" and "non-disclosure agreement". I was not disappointed.

As you suspect it is definitely a scam. This type all follow the same pattern.

lozzy1965

Thanks all for confirming. If I'd put in a better google search I would have found this, which I found this morning:

https://conversation.which.co.uk/money/telephone-share-buying-phone-scam-investment/

Identical, though different company names of course.

Worth posting so others are aware I guess.

eskbanker

To be honest there's probably no need to go beyond:

lozzy1965 wrote: »

Pretty sure this is a scam, but thought I'd post for others' thoughts.
Got a cold call from these guys....

MaxiRobriguez

At least you questioned yourself and checked.

It's nice to finally see someone avoid a scam by being vigilant, rather than asking what they can do to recover money because they weren't.

MaxiRobriguez

eskbanker wrote: »

To be honest there's probably no need to go beyond:

Exactly my first thought too!

DrSyn

Simple self defence on the phone.

If anyone cold calls you:-

(a) About any investment opportunity.

(b) They are your bank and you need to move your money to another account to keep it safe.

(c) They are from Microsoft and you have a virus on your computer.

(d) They are your internet provider and you will be cut off unless press button B etc.

(d) Whats any information, fill in a questioner.

JUST HANG UP!

A scammer finds its more difficult to talk you into one of their scams if they can not talk to you to begin with.

Uxb1

Same applies to anyone who appears at your door as well.
I get these - complete with a sob story about how they are hard done by, out of prison, discharged from the army etc.
They are trying to sell their wares.
I say I'm not interested and I never ever buy from cold callers
They then try the hard sell by saying let me just show you my "stuff"
They then waste 5 minutes - until I say I'm still not interested and told you this 5 minutes ago and I don't buy from cold callers and if you had listened you could have been on your way 5 minutes ago.
Their demeanor then immediately changes to a tirade of abuse as they leave.
I've seen multiple of them working the area on one day
Some locals even say they have seen "Mr Big" dropping them off to ply their "trade"

bostonerimus

I get scam calls quite often, usually about my computer needing service or some error in my taxes. Sometimes I will play along and just answer "yes" to every question they ask. Eventually they get wise, but not before I've wasted some of their time and annoyed them.