Deceptive Broker Acts

Securities Law Attorney Advising Investors in the Los Angeles Area

Investors trust brokers to make decisions that will be in their financial future’s best interests, just as patients trust a doctor to provide them with the treatment that will best ensure their future health. Unfortunately, many brokers abuse this trust and use their clients’ funds to make personal financial gains, even when those decisions result in a detriment to the investor’s accounts and finances. Dedicated securities law lawyer Steve A. Buchwalter can help Los Angeles investors try to get back on their feet if they have been burned by their brokers. The financial system and investment practices can be difficult to understand and interpret, especially if your broker tried to hide his or her deceptive acts. Our team can help you identify how your broker misled you and pursue the compensation that you deserve.

Hold Your Broker Liable After Sustaining Unnecessary Financial Losses

State and federal securities laws require brokers and other financial professionals to provide their clients with certain levels of integrity and competence. These laws hold brokers responsible for any losses to investors’ accounts caused by their fraud, misrepresentations, or omissions. Investors often have little to no experience with complex investment transactions, leaving them vulnerable to a broker who takes advantage of a client’s lack of sophistication. Because of this, the law views the broker’s relationship to his or her client as that of a fiduciary, which requires the highest level of care and duty to the client’s needs.

Brokers can mislead their clients in a number of ways when it comes to making investments and decisions about how to allocate funds. Excessive churning, for example, occurs when a broker makes repeated investments in order to create commissions. These transactions are often unnecessary and motivated solely by the broker’s desire to increase his or her commission fees. The broker may make a misrepresentation to the investor about why he or she is making so many transactions in order to convince the investor that the transactions are necessary.

Other ways that brokers can mislead clients are recommending that the client invest in high commissioned products that predominately benefit the broker such as variable annuities, REITS, limited partnerships, or other obscure investments.

If your broker engages in any of these deceptive acts, federal and California laws provide legal remedies to you that can potentially help you recover the money that you lost. The law allows an investor to recover the difference between the amount of money contained in his or her account after the broker’s deceptive acts and the amount of money that would have been in his or her account had the broker not engaged in those acts. Determining this amount requires a careful and thorough understanding of securities laws and transactions in order to ensure that the investor makes a claim to recover the full amount of compensation that he or she is owed.

Consult a Los Angeles Lawyer for Your Investment Fraud Claim

You should not let a dishonest and deceptive broker get away with causing you grave financial harm. Although bringing a claim against your broker may seem daunting and stressful, investment fraud attorney Steve A. Buchwalter can guide residents of Los Angeles and the surrounding regions through the process. As a former stockbroker, he knows what it takes to put together a compelling case. We have helped clients throughout Orange, Ventura, and Santa Barbara Counties regain control over their financial future after falling victim to a dishonest broker’s tactics. Call us now at 1-(818) 501-8987 or contact us online to set up a free consultation.