April 13, 2011

Securities arbitration attorney Jake Zamansky has authored a new article on the risks of investing in structured products for Wall Street Lawyer  magazine. Here is a short summary of the article:

The past several years have seen some important developments in the field of investor fraud cases against Wall Street firms relating to the sale of “structured products.”

Sales of structured products by Wall Street firms to retail and institutional investors have skyrocketed in recent years. As most investments have been providing very low yield or return, firms have pushed complex and opaque structured products which, in theory, offer an opportunity for enhanced and outsized returns to investors who are “chasing yield,” but very often provide hidden risks and substantial losses.

This article examines some of the problems encountered by investors in the sale of structured products and some of the recent decisions by courts, arbitration panels and regulatory agencies relating to the sale of structured products.

The full article is available here .

If you have invested structured products, particularly those issued by Lehman Brothers or linked to the performance of Apple stock, please contact us using the contact form at the left side of this page or by calling us at (212) 742-1414 for a free consultation with a FINRA arbitration attorney to discuss your legal rights.

Zamansky LLC  continues to file claims on behalf of investors who bought so-called “100% Principal Protection Notes ” issued by Lehman Brothers. Investors were improperly sold these and other Lehman notes by brokers at major Wall Street firms including UBS, which sold as much as $1 billion worth of the product. As the name promises, the notes were marketed as “risk free” investments perfect for retirement accounts. In truth, the notes were unsecured obligations subject to the credit risk of Lehman, and their value was wiped out after Lehman collapsed in September 2008.

In December 2009, Zamansky LLC secured the first arbitration award relating to UBS’s sale of these Lehman notes on behalf of an investor in South Carolina. In addition to ordering UBS to reimburse the investor for most of her losses, the arbitration panel also required UBS to pay interest, plus all related expenses, including attorneys’ fees. Since that time we have represented dozens of investors from coast to coast who were victimized by UBS’s misconduct.

In June 2011, our firm secured yet another Lehman note victory against UBS. the largest win to date with a total recovery in excess of $2 million.  We were able to demonstrate that UBS’s senior management hid its true views about Lehman’s deteriorating financial condition from its customers-and even from its own brokers.  We showed that the firm looked out for the bottom line of its big institutional clients rather than the hard-fought life savings of its retail customers.  And we proved that as bankruptcy approached, UBS shrewdly guarded its own coffers while leaving its customers holding the bag.  In the end, the FINRA arbitration panel awarded our client all of his money back (less the residual value of the notes) plus interest.

If you have suffered losses as a result of an investment in Lehman notes, please contact us by emailing jake@zamansky.com  or calling (212) 742-1414.

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