William Galvin, the top securities regulator in Massachusetts, filed a Complaint against GPB Capital this week that alleges GPB Capital issued illegal marketing materials filled with misstatements and omissions of material fact in the course of selling its investments to clients.
Meyer Wilson has been on top of the GPB Capital debacle since it started last year, and we currently represent dozens of investor victims across the country. You can read more about our efforts and lawsuits at our website, www.gpblawyer.com.
Galvin identifies some of GPB Capital’s self-dealing in the Complaint, which includes a network of entities that sought to appear different but were one-and-the-same. GPB Capital paid Ascendant Alternative Strategies and Ascendant Capital millions of dollars in connection with marketing GPB Capital funds and in connection with acquisitions made by GPB Capital. Publicly, GPB Capital and Ascendant Capital sought to appear as two distinct companies, but in reality, the Massachusetts regulator says they were one-and-the-same.
The Complaint also details some of the underlying securities fraud under Massachusetts Blue Sky laws – that investors contributed to GPB Capital funds under false and misleading pretenses, in reliance on GPB Capital private placement memoranda and marketing materials, and without knowing that GPB Capital continually engaged in self-dealing from inception.
As time went on and GPB Capital raised more money, Galvin says that GPB Capital was unable to use its capital efficiently. As investor contributions increased, so did the funds required to continue to pay investor distributions. In order to keep up with distributions, GPB Capital began dipping into investor contributions to meet the demands of the 8% monthly distributions. According to the Complaint, the GPB Capital funds’ financials show that distributions were issued that exceeded the funds’ net incomes. But GPB Capital never updated any of its disclosure or marketing materials to reflect this.
In an interview with the Boston Globe, Galvin said,
“CLEARLY THE MATERIALS THAT WERE PRESENTED, THE REPRESENTATIONS THAT WERE MADE, WERE NOT TRUE…. WE’RE LOOKING TO FREE THESE INVESTORS OF THEIR OBLIGATIONS.”
