PHOENIX — Lake Havasu certified public accountant Lance Michael Bersch and his affiliated company, ER Financial & Advisory Services, has been ordered to pay $2.6 million in restitution and a total of $816,000 in administrative penalties for fraudulently selling unregistered securities and registration violations.
The Corporation Commission also ordered Concordia Financing Company, Ltd. of California to jointly pay $2.6 million restitution and a $700,000 administrative penalty for its securities registration violations, according to a statement by the Arizona Corporation Commission.
The Corporation Commission found that Bersch and the late David Wanzek, a CPA also affiliated with the firm, fraudulently sold unregistered investment contracts in Concordia, which was in the business of purchasing and servicing subprime loans to truck drivers who purchased and used big rig trucks.
The commission found that Bersch, Wanzek and ER Financial were not registered to sell securities in Arizona, and they failed to disclose to several investors the finders’ fees Concordia paid them for selling the investments. Concordia did nothing to determine if an investor had the financial wherewithal to make an investment, and it failed to use questionnaires or other materials to determine whether investors were accredited investors, the commission’s statement said.