Howard M. Appel is a bad guy who has been convicted of securities fraud multiple times. This time it was for actions in 2010 through 2013. He secretly acquiring large blocks of stock in three publicly traded companies and then manipulated the market for those shares with co-conspirators. It was classic pump and dump schemes.
He assembled a team of associates to hold shares on his behalf. He created liquidity by conducting matched trades, increasing the volume of trades but with no economic effect. Then the associates would start raising the trading price through their trading activity. Meanwhile, Appel would convince 3rd parties to buy the stock with the story of its rising price. Then he would have his associates sell the stock for a big profit. As he walked away, the stock price would crash.
What caught my attention in this case was Appel’s criminal history. He was in jail from June 2008 to June 2010 for conspiracy and money laundering in connection with a previous pump an dump scheme. He was on supervised release from June 2010 until June 2013.
He was running the new pump and dump schemes while under supervised release.
Clearly, more supervision was need.
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