Eleven reasons to not do business with Boston-based Fidelity Inestments:
CONTENTS
1) Fidelity is Heavily invested in the Military-Industrial Complex
2) Drugs and Prostitutes
3) Robert Gates (DoD, CIA, SAIC) was a a Fidelity director Until 2006
4) Investments in Genocide
5) CENSORSHIP OF THE FIDELITY GENOCIDE ISSUE
6) Willful Violations of Money Laundering and Anti-Terrorism Laws
7) Dwarf Tossing
8) Insider Trading
9) Annuity Fraud
10) More Genocide
11) Class Warfare
Fidelity and the Military-Industrial Complex:From: "Flirting with Fascism -- US Imperialism's Hidden Romance"
www.agitprop.org.au
" ... The major financial institutions of Wall Street have heavy stakes in the military business, as do new power centres. FMR Corporation, the holding company of the Fidelity Group of mutual funds — the largest in the world, with over $400 billion in assets — has the most widespread military equipment holdings, including 6.7 per cent of Lockheed Martin, 10.2 per cent of General Dynamics, 22.8 per cent of Litton Industries and 6.1 per cent of Northrop Grumman. ... "
http://www.agitprop.org.au/stopnato/1999110502.php
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Drugs and Prostitutes
" ... In Boston, the U.S. attorney's office is separately investigating whether brokers paid for illegal drugs and prostitutes for Fidelity traders, including at a bachelor's party in March 2003 that Mr. Quinn and rivals from two other brokerage firms helped pay for, according to people familiar with the matter. ..."
http://fidelityobserver.blogspot.com/2005/08/fidelity-bribery-scandal-and-this.html
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Robert Gates (Dod, formerly CIA, SAIC) was a Fidelity director Until 2006
" ... Gates' largest source of outside income last year, at $373,000, was from Boston-based Fidelity Investments, one of the world's largest investment houses. Gates' Fidelity holdings are described as deferred compensation, according to his disclosures. Gates said recently that he would resign from Fidelity's board, on which he has served for nine years. Elected last year as chairman of the board's independent directors, Gates and his group oversee 345 mutual funds, including ones featuring U.S. defense and energy stocks. He commuted from Texas for 11 board meetings a year, once noting that he had missed only one meeting because of a conflict with a college event. Gates' Fidelity salary was set by the independent directors. ... "
"Gates' personal holdings have grown substantially since he left government, when he had no more than $165,000 in savings and retirement accounts. Now, he has $1.1 million in holdings with Fidelity Investments, as well as stock holdings in some of the companies where he has served as director. ... "
http://www.oldamericancentury.org/bb/lofiversion/index.php/t12560.html
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Investments in Genocide
"As you know, Greens and other activists have been protesting Al Gore because his mother's trust owns stock in Occidental Petroleum, which has been striving to drill for oil on the sacred lands of the indigenous U'wa people in Colombia. In the US, the protests have had two main targets: Mr. Gore and Fidelity Investments, one of the largest holders of Occidental stock. Fidelity holds far more shares, by the way, than Pauline Gore's trust. Fidelity controls about $500 million worth of Occidental Stock, according to the Rainforest Action Network, which accuses Fidelity of "Investing in Genocide." Protestors have urged Fidelity investors to divest from Fidelity unless Fidelity pressures Occidental to cancel its Colombia project. ...
"Fidelity Magellan also owns stock in Dick Cheney's Halliburton Company, which has been linked in a published report to the deaths of environmental activists and indigenous people in the Niger Delta. "
http://www.bushwatch.com/nader2000.htm
CENSORSHIP OF THE FIDELITY GENOCIDE ISSUE
" ... Fidelity Investments is staring down an advertising campaign that urges its money managers to 'stop investing in companies that fund genocide in Darfur.' Major media outlets are also on the spot. The mutual funds giant said it recently convinced CNN and Newsweek to change their minds about running ads sponsored by The Save Darfur Coalition. ...
http://www.boston.com/news/globe/editorial_opinion/oped/articles/2007/05/10/divestment_dilemma/
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Willful Violations of Money Laundering and Anti-Terrorism Laws
Former compliance officer blows whistle on Fidelity Investments over willful Patriot Act violations
July 3, 2007
A lawsuit against Fidelity Investments accuses the mutual fund giant of deliberately avoiding and violating portions of the U.S. Patriot Act. The whistle was blown on the company by, of all people, one of its former compliance officers. What has resulted is a mess of finger-pointing, additional lawsuits, and rush to put a seal on anything related to the case or the purported activity.
David van Duyn, who worked as an anti-money laundering advisor for the company, accused Fidelity executives of instructing him to sidestep the Patriot Act, which laid out requirements for monitoring and reporting client transactions. To top things off, he accuses his former superiors of handing down orders to falsify documents. Duyn claims the company blatantly violated the Act and other laws intended to track money laundering and funding for terrorist networks.
Fidelity has countered with a suit of its own in an effort to prevent Duyn from divulging “confidential information” - which Fidelity insists would violate the company’s non-disclosure agreement signed by employees. The suit is in addition to its hurried efforts to stamp out from the public record any potentially damaging information or allegations surrounding its internal policies and possible negligence of customer accounts.
http://ethisphere.com/former-compliance-officer-blows-whistle-on-fidelity-investments-over-willful-patriot-act-violations/
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Dwarf Tossing
SEC probes dwarf-tossing party for Fidelity trader
By Jason Nisse
Sunday, 14 August 2005
US regulators probing "inappropriate gifts" given to dealers at the financial giant Fidelity Investments have unearthed evidence of an astonishing party.
The March 2003 bachelor weekend for Thomas Bruderman Jnr, a star Fidelity trader, was paid for by three Wall Street firms - Jefferies & Co, Lazard and SG Cowan. A $65,000 (£36,000) private jet was laid on to take Mr Bruderman and his guests, who included Fidelity's then head of stock trading, Scott DeSano, and Dennis Kozlowski, the former head of Tyco International, from Boston to Miami. They were put up at the Delano Hotel, beloved of celebrities such as Madonna, and taken out on a yacht, along with at least two women who were hired to attend.
Another person hired was Danny Black, who describes himself as the "Heidi Fleiss of dwarf talent". His official role was as a waiter, but he also allowed himself to be thrown by partygoers in an activity called "dwarf tossing". Mr Black said that it "was a lavish party and a good time was had by all". ...
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/business/news/sec-probes-dwarftossing-party-for-fidelity-trader-502734.html
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Insider Trading
SEC Charges Fidelity Trader with Insider Trading
24/04/2008
"The SEC has charged David Donovan, Jr., a former equity trader at Fidelity Investments, and David Hinkle, a former broker at Capital Institutional Services, with defrauding Fidelity and its advisory clients through a series of inside trades. According to the Commission’s allegations, Donovan and Hinkle used confidential information from Fidelity’s internal order database to trade on or ahead of the firm’s orders. The SEC claims that the duo failed to inform Fidelity about the trades and that they profited through them.
"The SEC’s suit seeks disgorgement with prejudgment interest and the imposition of civil penalties against Donovan and Hinkle. ... "
http://www.csapartners.eu/blog/index.php/category/insider-trading-scandal/
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Fidelity - The House of Annuity Fraud
http://www.thesqueakywheel.com/complaints/2006/APR/complaint8728.cfm
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More Genocide
Investors Against Genocide launched, extending the work of Fidelity Out Of Sudan
On September 5, the Fidelity Out Of Sudan campaign broadened its investment firm targets and launched Investors Against Genocide. In addition to Fidelity, targets will include other major financial institutions with large holdings in PetroChina.
The InvestorsAgainstGenocide.org site will replace and extend the FidelityOutOfSudan.com website and continue the work against Fidelity, while extending to the other major holders of PetroChina. ...
http://fidelityoutofsudan.googlepages.com/
Also see: Fidelity's Sudan Problem, Forbes: "Fidelity is the biggest investor in PetroChina. PetroChina is one of the largest companies operating in Sudan. They're pumping tons of oil. And that's generating massive amounts of revenue for the government of Sudan." The Khartoum government has been condemned by the United States, the U.N. and most everybody else who has paid attention to the long-running crisis in Darfur, where an estimated 400,000 people have died. How has Fidelity responded to calls for divestment? With form letters and prepared statements. ... "
http://money.cnn.com/2007/01/29/news/companies/pluggedin_gunther_sudan.fortune/index.htm
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Class Warfare
Fidelity Investments "at War with the Workers of America"
" ... AFL-CIO Secretary-Treasurer Richard Trumka [said]: 'There is a war against the workers of America. The labor movement is confronting all the aiders and abetters of corporate greed and the corporate con men.' Fidelity Investments refuses to make public its proxy voting, regarding major decisions it makes about its shareholders’ mutual funds, including those workers of the major corporations that it handles. ... "
http://www.pww.org/index.php/article/view/1773/1/103/
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