by Structured Settlement Watchdog
If a statistic published by the National Association of Settlement Purchasers is to be believed, then the amount of structured settlement factoring has tripled in 4 years.
Here's how NASP responds to a "frequently asked question":
Q: Do most people receiving structured settlement payments sell their future payments?
No, most people receive payments according to the original schedule. In our experience, less than 15% of structured settlement recipients ever complete a secondary market transaction National Association of Settlement Purchasers website, retrieved June 5, 2017
Compare NASP's response to these
"...an estimated 5% of structured settlement recipients at some time find that they need liquidity" Matt Bracy, former President of the National Association of Settlement Purchasers, former General Counsel to Settlement Capital and then of the law firm of Nesbitt Vassar McCown and Jason Lazarus, of Orlando based Synergy Settlements, 2013 ,retrieved June 5, 2017 from Synergy website
"The Company is the leading purchaser and servicer of structured settlements nationwide with an estimated 50% plus market share. Since their inception, the Company and it non-debtor affiliates consummated over 51,000 guaranteed and life contingent structured settlement transactions with aggregate payment streams of approximately $3.9 Billion...since 1995" JG Wentworth prepackaged bankruptcy disclosure statement May 7, 2009
Supply and Demand?
On the one hand one could simply chalk up the purported increased activity to supply and demand, but there is increasing information about something far more sinister going on.
Fulminating exposure of bad business practices perpetrated by members of the structured settlement secondary market, whose sales practices have continued to be unregulated in most states. There was an Increasing demand for structured settlement payment rights by investors sold to investors using the scam label "secondary market annuities". There is nothing to check how originators solicit annuitants to meet the demand. For example, the lack of regulation enabled convicted Ponzi schemer and money launderer Todd Dyer to be involved in the establishment of Income Stream Exchange. Serial felon Dyer was recently convicted and sentenced to a new 15 year jail term for ripping off investors in another matter.
- Instances in New York and Florida of hundreds of structured settlement transfer documents being forged. In the New York case that came to light in late 2013, convicted Thomas Rubino, a former paralegal for the New York Personal Injury law firm of Paris & Chaikin, claimed that his motivation to forge the documents was due to relieve the pressure of the volume of work he was assigned.
- Use of paid fake testimonials by multiple Maryland based structured settlement factoring companies
- A 2013 deposition admission and legal finding in 2015 that Maryland based structured settlement factoring intermediary created and controlled fake linked in profiles. I established how Springer fraudulently used these fake profiles to endorse himself.
- The Structured Settlement Secondary Market Fills a Need But Reckless Lack of Oversight of The Secondary and Tertiary Market Creates Problems on Need of Constructive Solutions 2015
- IRS Memo on Structured Settlement Factoring Excise Tax under IRC §5891 November 28, 2016, clues IRS auditors in structured settlement factoring abuses by highlighting 3 scenarios., including forum shopping and different ways structured settlement factoring companies have attempted to skirt the law.
- Access Funding is Slammed in Washington Post for Preying on Poor Black Baltimore City Lead Paint Victims. August 2015
- Cedric Martez Thomas Gets Hosed by 365 Advance Services/Novation Funding October 2015
- Terrence Taylor Story Makes National News 2015 [Taylor's 11 structured settlement factoring transactions were all completed in a 2 year period between 2012-2014 and approved in a single Virginia courtroom, 8 by the same judge. Taylor was still being solicited in 2015]
- CBC Settlement Funding solicits annuitants to be members of "Settlement Union" 2013
- Seneca One solicits annuitants using " Settlement Accounting" 2013
- Einstein Structured Settlements/JRR Funding took out an ad in Crains Chicago to hustle new business using fake Settlement Planning Seminar 2014
- Annuity Sold hustled annuitants by fraudulently claiming to be licensed to purchase structured settlement payments in all 50 states
Cause and Effect
If the percentage that NASP says is true then it is plausible that the increase in sales is directly related to the shady business practices.
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