If You’re Gonna Inflate Valuations, Best To Avoid The ‘Impossible’

We here at Dealbreaker wish to congratulate James R. Velissaris of Atlanta for hitting the (alleged) fraud trifecta.

The U.S. attorney’s office in Manhattan charged Mr. Velissaris with securities fraud, wire fraud, lying to auditors and obstruction of justice. He faces up to 20 years in prison on each count…. The Securities and Exchange Commission and Commodity Futures Trading Commission also filed civil complaints against Mr. Velissaris….

And how did Velissaris achieve this distinction? Well, creatively, of course. Arguably (and, as ever, allegedly) too creatively.

The U.S. attorney’s office said Mr. Velissaris overvalued derivatives positions by tweaking inputs to the Bloomberg Valuations Service, which was used to calculate the positions values.

In some cases, Mr. Velissaris made adjustments that caused positions to have anomalous and “impossible valuations,” prosecutors said. In others, identical positions in the mutual fund and hedge fund had diverging values./When the SEC started investigating the matter, Mr. Velissaris sought to cover it up, prosecutors said. He provided Infinity Q’s auditor with false documents that tried to support the “fraudulently inflated values” and provided false information to regulators.

Infinity Q Investment Adviser Faces Securities Fraud Charges [WSJ]

For more of the latest in litigation, regulation, deals and financial services trends, sign up for Finance Docket, a partnership between Breaking Media publications Above the Law and Dealbreaker.