The US Commodity Futures Trading Commission has obtained USD280,000 in civil monetary penalties and equitable relief in consent orders of permanent injunction against Randy Burstein of
The US Commodity Futures Trading Commission has obtained USD280,000 in civil monetary penalties and equitable relief in consent orders of permanent injunction against Randy Burstein of Miami Beach, Florida and Nader Yazdani of Boca Raton, Florida.
Both are former employees of Liberty Financial Trading and Liberty Real Assets Investment.
The sanctions resolve a CFTC enforcement action that charged them with fraudulently soliciting customers to trade commodity options.
The order against Burstein requires him to pay USD120,000 in restitution to defrauded customers and a USD120,000 civil monetary penalty. The order against Yazdani requires him to pay USD10,000 in restitution and a USD30,000 civil monetary penalty. The orders also impose permanent trading and registration bans against both Burstein and Yazdani.
The consent orders were issued on 15 July 2009 by the Honorable K. Michael Moore of the US District Court for the Southern District of Florida. The orders find that Burstein and Yazdani, while employed at Liberty, made false and misleading sales solicitations. For example, the orders find that they misrepresented the likelihood of profits from trading commodity options and failed to disclose the risk of loss inherent in trading commodity options, while heralding the profit opportunities. In addition, the court found that they failed to disclose Liberty’s dismal performance record trading commodity options for customer accounts and misrepresented the actual performance record of customers’ accounts.
Earlier, the court issued consent orders against Liberty, Ted Romeo, and Leslie Weiner (Yazdani’s and Burstein’s co-defendants), finding that they fraudulently solicited customers. These orders imposed restitution, civil monetary penalties, and trading and registration bans.
