On August 14, 2001 American Stock Exchange (“AMEX”) listed Hemispherx Biopharma, Inc. (AMEX: HEB) (Price: $3.85) reported shares outstanding of 30,330,382 shares as of June 30, 2001. Hemispherx was exposed as a medical stock scam in the third quarter of 1998. Since its 1997 listing on the AMEX, the AMEX has allowed Hemispherx to continually disseminate medical claims that the FDA has found illegal and to sell 13.6 million of its shares to the public. The AMEX’s failure to regulate Hemispherx has resulted in a congressional investigation of the AMEX’s listing requirements.
A five page single-spaced report containing 40 exhibits dealing with the involvement of four leaders of the AMEX in the Hemispherx stock scam and the AMEX’s subsequent questionable harassment of Hemispherx short sellers and the AMEX’s failure to delist Hemispherx is available upon request through asensio.com.
Hemispherx insiders have included Jordan Belfort, a former principal of Stratton Oakmont, which led the conversion of HEB from a defunct private shell into a public stock fraud. Belfort has pled guilty to federal criminal charges of manipulating the prices of a group of public companies that included Hemispherx. According to the indictment, Belfort obtained control of substantial equity positions in the manipulated stocks, which included Hemispherx, by agreeing to finance the companies only if those companies agreed to register large blocks of stock in the names of nominees.
Joseph Giamanco, the former president of Hemispherx’s AMEX specialist firm GHM, Inc., got Hemispherx shares privately before Hemispherx’s Belfort-led financing. In March 2001, Giamanco was sanctioned and permanently barred from the AMEX for failing to cooperate with an AMEX investigation. The AMEX was investigating trading in accounts in which Giamanco held an undisclosed interest and that also privately obtained Hemispherx shares.
Hemispherx is being investigated for fraud by the SEC under a formal order dated April 1, 1999 and the U.S. General Accounting Office as per a request by U.S. Representative John D. Dingell dated September 18, 2000 to audit the listing practices of the AMEX. William A. Carter was Hemispherx’s leader when Hemispherx made payments and executed transactions that are the subject of at least 6 federal criminal indictments and other New York state indictments. Over the past 25 years, Carter has been accused of unethical and illegal behavior by Hemispherx itself, of extortion by an AIDS patient, of scientific fraud by E.I. Dupont, of improper medical work by a hospital and his own staff and was fired by that hospital after years of disputes and lawsuits.
Asensio & Company, Inc. is actively engaged in short selling and advises its clients on securities it believes are overvalued. A complete documented history of Asensio’s published work with short-selling transactions, and the firm’s definition of gross overvaluation, is available on the Internet at www.asensio.com. Short selling involves a risk not associated with the purchase of stock including, but not limited to, unlimited loss and stock borrowing risks. John Wiley & Sons, Inc. has published a book about Asensio & Company’s short selling titled “Sold Short: Uncovering Deception in the Markets.” The book can be ordered on the Internet at www.asensio.com and www.wallstreetbabylon.com, or www.amazon.com. Additional information is available upon request.