Fri, 2015/03/13 — 1:30pm | Your editor

I wrote two important emails today. Here they are:

Dear Advogado RG,

Thank you for your note. We are determined to go ahead; the problem is to find an authority on Portuguese securities law to take our case about Portugal Telecom.

My hope was that, assuming your firm is not subject to a conflict of interest because of representing various Portuguese oligarchs who are part of the problem (which I hope is not the case), you might find the nature of our complaint of interest as an international securities law expert.

We made a supposedly safe investment in a multinational telephone company from a supposedly developed and well-regulated country in the European Union. Its American Depositary Receipts were registered with the US Securities and Exchange Commission for listing on the main New York Stock Exchange.

Frankly, to have the Portugal Telecom cash horde of nearly $1 billion disappear into a black hole in a Luxembourg entity owned by the second largest bank in Portugal is unusual, astonishing, and an indication of a gap in the EU securities and banking regulation.

That is what I am trying to lure you into thinking about.

This history undermines the future appeal of any share listed in Lisbon to foreign investors who will fear toleration of insider dealing and shareholder abuse from both the Bank of Portugal and the CMVM, the supposed regulators. What this means for your country may be another reason to be willing to take on this case.

We have collected (in 3 days) $700 in US currency, not euros 700. The amount appears to be growing in euros by the day. I converted for your convenience. As I said, we can raise more from our readers if we have a representative working on our complaint in Portugal. I contacted you because you have published impressive material on cross-border securities regulation, what this case is about. I am prepared to use my position as editor of Global Investing to solicit further contributions from the readers. But I wanted to warn you that we do not have large funding such as a corporation might have.

Our purpose is not merely to gain compensation in cash. It is to highlight a scandalous misuse of corporate funds to the detriment of the shareholders so that it will not be allowed to happen again. New laws are needed, and you could write them.

If you are certain you do not want to take this case please let me know. We have been given by a British solicitor the names of two Portuguese colleagues he works with, and I will then contact them.

obrigada and best wishes

Vivian Lewis

to: Jimmy@marketacross.com

dear Jimmy Rodela

Thank you for your offer to pay us for accepted articles about Israeli companies which are your clients. Global Investing does not accept planted articles about stocks. Our earnings come only from subscription and advertisements labeled as such. (I resisted the temptation to send Jimmy the names of some other bigger and richer newsletter groups with lower ethics.)

More for paid subscribers from Portugal (of course), Brazil, Angola, and a few places where they do not speak Portuguese, like Canada, India, Scandinavia, Colombia, The Netherlands, and Spain, including two new annual reports from our companies. Plus two trade alerts. Our special report on Portugal Telecom is now posted on the www.global-investing.com website. All proceeds from sale to non-subscribers goes to our PT legal fund. There is plenty more about PT for subscribers below.