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Is it likely that the London office of a US-based broker will have an SEC Officer 'in-house'?

This is in regard to confirming a purchase with the company. The call time was between 3am and 4am London time. I am in Australia.

Company describe themselves as an 'Alternative Asset Manager': "a leading global alternative asset manager, focused on investing in long-life, top-notch assets across technology, infrastructure, renewable power and equity that is private". They claim to have a block of shares to sell to investors at a favourable price.

GeoffOz
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I have worked for an alternative asset manager that had SEC personal in the office when the SEC was doing their semi-periodic audits. I'll mention they showed up at 8am and left at 5pm as if they had a clock set. This was just my experience.

It seems unlikely but not out of the realm of reason that someone from the SEC would be in a US company's London office. It seems rather unlikely that a firm would tell someone about the SEC presence over the phone. If I recall, we were asked to not mention the presence of SEC to anyone outside the firm while they were there. I'm not sure if that was company policy or an SEC request.

I don't work for the SEC so don't take this as an answer. I'd call the SEC. They may be able to confirm the presence and they may be interested in a US firm that would use their name in a sales call.

rhaskett
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