The SMV*, Panama's securities regulatory agency, facing multiple inquiries, from American, Canadian and EU securities regulators, has not only stonewalled those queries, without any satisfactory reason, it has actually gone over the edge. SMV employees have been seen, by witnesses, destroying documents en masse. The Financial Pacific/Petaquilla Minerals Ltd. insider trading scandal has shaken the agency to its very foundations. It is to be considered both dysfunctional, and untrustworthy, as its staff members, and executives, unable to explain away its abject failures, fear criminal prosecution, and even physical harm, from angry foreign investors.
Class actions suits are either being prepared, or ready for filing, in North America, and Europe, and you can expect a number of corrupt SMV officials to quietly disappear from their Panama City offices. Do not expect SMV to be of any assistance to US or Canadian investigators; it should be dissolved, and a new regulatory agency created, as the present one is not only useless, it is a reminder of the systemic corruption that pervaded the government under the discredited Martinelli government, and which resulted in securities fraud, on a grant scale.
SMV staff shared confidential information with target companies, sabotaged investigations, and made sure that victims of securities fraud never received justice for their claims. The agency cannot be repaired; please close it forthwith.
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| Former SMV director Ignacio Fabrega, under criminal indictment |
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*Superindendency of Market Securities
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