Nearly 27,000 retail investors who are owed approximately $1.6 billion were the last to find out about GWG Holdings, Inc.’s serious financial troubles.[1] Most only became aware when GWG defaulted on $13.6 million dollars in payments plus interest in February of 2022.
But GWG Holdings and Beneficient, its corporate partner’s history of suspicious activity began far earlier at the highest levels. GWG was meant to raise money in the form of GWG-L Bonds and Beneficient was to acquire stakes in private-equity funds and other advanced investing assets with the stated benefit of opening these risky markets to rank-and-file investors.
Instead, as early as June 2019, Beneficient’s CFO, Tiffany Kice, discovered that millions of dollars were going into the pocket of Brad Heppner, then serving as chairman of the board for Both GWG Holdings and Beneficient in the form of personal travel by private jet, his 1,500 acre ranch, and trust holdings he was a substantial beneficiary of. Kice resigned in July after her concerns were rejected, violently, by Heppner. Three board directors, and four C-Level executives soon followed.
And yet, despite these alarms and documented concerns about the solvency of the GWG-L Bond product, sales were “aggressively and misleadingly marketed and sold” by brokers and continued to climb through 2020. When in July 2021, the SEC intervened and concluded that Beneficient’s accounting methods were faulty, they were merely restating problems that Kice had documented nearly two years earlier.
As the depths of this scam continue to unfold, investors are left with massive losses, waiting for legal action to take its course against GWG Holdings with no guarantee that bondholders will receive more than a fraction of their investments.
You may, instead, be able to recoup some of your losses through FINRA arbitration against your broker-dealer that sold you the GWG L-Bonds. Rose Law is currently representing clients of Kansas City based broker Advanced Financial Solutions, and is actively investigating Moloney Securities.
Across the country, investors are winning their cases against brokers who recommended GWG L Bonds against fiduciary trust. Contact Us today to find out if you have a claim.
[1] Wall Street Journal: $2 Billion Default Followed Warnings to Everyone but Investors
Beneficient executives and board directors headed for the exits over signs of trouble—long before a financial blowup that is now under investigation by the SEC and which could leave nearly 28,000 investors empty-handed
