Federal prosecutors and Securities and Exchange Commission counsel are looking into Freedom Holding, a Nasdaq-listed Kazakh financial company that has been the target of prominent short sellers, regarding compliance problems, insider stock trading, and an offshore affiliate connected to sanctioned people, CNBC has learned.
Documents seen by CNBC and sources with knowledge of the situation indicate that the SEC’s Boston regional office has been looking into Freedom for months. Timur Turlov, a 35-year-old millionaire CEO and former Russian citizen, controls and owns the company, which has its headquarters in Almaty, Kazakhstan, and has a $5 billion market valuation.
Following CNBC’s report, Freedom shares dropped as high as 9.3% on Friday morning. According to the documents and individuals, the concurrent SEC and DOJ investigations are examining the company’s internal controls and offshore operations as well as Turlov’s statements that Freedom can give access to its primarily Russian client list to hot U.S. IPOs.
Source (CNBC)
