The
Securities and Exchange Commission has frozen the assets of an investment advisor in Georgia, who has gone missing after carrying out an alleged $40 million investment fraud.

Dating back to 2009, Aubrey Lee Price allegedly raised around $40 million from approximately 115 investors, most of whom were based in Georgia and Florida, the SEC’s complaint says. He did this by marketing an unregistered investment fund which he managed called PFG, which was sold as investing in traditional securities but also invested in illiquid investments like South American real estate and a troubled Georgia bank.

“In order to conceal mounting losses of investor funds, Price created bogus account statements with false account balances and returns that were provided to investors and bank regulators,” the SEC says.

He created a number of separate entities – PFG, PFGBI, Montgomery Asset Investment Adviser and Montgomery Asset Managing Member – but there was an “extreme intermingling of corporate forms, roles and statements” between these, said the complaint.

Moreover, he allegedly made “large” wire transfers from a custodial account to an operating account, before closing the custodial account without informing investors, at which time he had only “minimal funds” remaining in the various entities’ other accounts.

“Price raised nearly $40 million from investors and made woeful financial transactions that he hid from them,” said William Hicks, associate director of the SEC’s Atlanta regional office. “Now both the money and Price are missing.”