March 2021 by L M.
In mid 2000 I worked for a Raymond James Branch in the DC area that has since been closed. The financial advisor I worked with had been engaging in unethical behavior. My boss forgot to place a stock order for a customer. Instead of placing a trade correction, he decided to place the order even though the price of the stock had increased. This client was a close friend of his that he had known for 20 years. I was uncomfortable with placing a trade incorrectly so I asked his partner if I could place a trade correction instead. He said yes. The next day I was fired. Later, I reported my suspicions of improper customer service to HQ after finding forged documents. HQ threatened to sue me and accused me of violating their policies. My bosses co-workers, former employees and business partner were aware that he had previously forged documents. If they had reported him, they would have been fired and sued too. Consequently clients who sue almost always lose since financial advisors have the upper hand and signed documents. Its a relationship that requires so much trust. You sign a document after being sold a product that may not work the way it was explained when fraud is involved. This is why people have to be extra cautious in choosing a financial advisor. According to publicly available records, my old boss has been reported at least a dozen times, he had dozens of tax liens on his record as well but half of these records have been allowed to be removed from his file. Nonetheless, roughly 4 clients have won their perspective law suits against the broker. But they still lost roughly a millions dollars combined. This doesn't include the practices he engaged in that resulted in a profit of much more than can ever be traced. *It can be traced but the securities regulatory body will never investigate him. He's well protected. I found that the State where he resides had investigated him at some point, I believe for tax evasion? It wasn't completely clear. Always check the brokers record. If they have a couple of things on their record, you can sometimes assume it's a cockroach. Seeing one means there are thousands more behind the wall. The regulatory body and broker dealers lose hundreds of thousands of dollars adjudicating one major complaint. It benefits them to scape goat and protect their assets rather than protect clients. The reason why I am posting this nearly two decades later is that the SEC, FINRA, Employers and co-workers did nothing to help clients who lost their life savings. Most clients don't know they've lost money. My old boss never took a lot. The dishonesty started small until 10 years later people started noticing large amounts missing. To be fair to him, he doesn't usually make big mistakes deliberately. He genuinely doesn't understand finances or what he's doing. He made millions by scamming customers and purchasing an existing client base with his families money. I also exhausted my entire bank account getting an attorney to represent me. It was the stupidest thing I've ever done since I had never heard back from Raymond James or my attorney after he wrote them a letter stating that I did not violate their policy. This means that they were only trying to mentally abuse me, putting me in fear for my livelihood and legal record. These people destroy so many. And until Yelp, there was no avenue to help others see how Financial Advisory works. There are some honest people and I'm sure Raymond James can pull numbers out of their back side with how many billions they've returned to clients but thats the same trick my ex boss pulled. Many clients had decent returns so they never had a reason to investigate the few hundreds they were missing each year. In a $500k portfolio, you would have to be a forensic accountant to see the pennies per trade that were stolen. And stealing $100-$500 from 150-200 clients a year would be difficult for an account to find, especially when there are few complaints and legitimate transactions with a clients signature. He wasn&#
