Tag: securities fraud

FraudSecurities

Nikola: The Next Tesla, Or A Fraud?

on October 8, 2020

Nikola founder, Trevor Milton, recently resigned from his position as Executive Chairman of the Board after facing accusations of fraud. Before delving into the fraud allegations, it is important to understand the genesis of the company, which adds to the gravity of the situation. You may recall, last week we delved into the upcoming fraud trial for former Theranos CEO Elizabeth Holmes. We wanted to continue covering this topic of high profile fraud.

Milton built Nikola in 2014 hoping to reform the transportation sector. His plan in accomplishing this goal was to create mainstream battery-electric and hydrogen-powered vehicles from state-of-the-art zero-emissions technology. Establishing a company based on the same inventor and mission as another company, Tesla to be specific, is not the only suspicious act Milton has committed.

According to Business Insider, on September 10th, 2020, a report published by the Hindenburg Research investment firm contains evidence of Milton providing false statements about his products. More specifically, the report accuses Milton of exaggerating the viability of his products and thus misinforming investors, partners, and consumers. An example of these fraudulent statements is based on a video demo advertising Nikola’s debut semi-truck, the allegedly hydrogen-powered “Nikola One.” The report revealed an exchange of text messages from a Nikola employee developing a plan to roll the vehicle down a hill to manipulate the “high-speed” aspect of the truck. Nikola diverted from the issue by stating the prototype was discarded and therefore irrelevant. To add, they thought the Hindenburg report was released as sabotage considering Nikola’s partnership with General Motors was finalized two days prior. It should be noted, Hindenburg is a short-seller, so they were interested in seeing Nikola’s stock price decline. (Photo Source: Twitter @HindenburgRes).

The company started trading on June 4th, after a reverse merger with VectoIQ. VectoIQ is a publicly-traded special purpose acquisition organization led by Stephen Girsky, the former Vice Chairman of General Motors. Before the Hindenburg report, Nikola was performing well in the stock market. A CNBC article stated that shares of Nikola Corporation increased by 20% at the end of the month. According to the closing price, Nikola was valued at almost $28.8 billion, making the corporation more valuable than Ford. However, Nikola’s stock market surge stemmed from Milton’s announcement of the company’s new battery-electric fuel-cell truck, the Badger. He followed his announcement confirming the company’s partnership with General Motors, a necessary move to get the new truck to market. Nikola did not anticipate to generate income until 2021, but investors were willing to provide a hefty sum for promising vehicles.

Despite the incident that led to his resignation, analysts think Milton’s exodus is a positive and necessary step for the progression of both Nikola and General Motors. Whether the motive for resigning was personal or strictly business, with Milton absent there will be less negative publicity.

What does this mean for Trevor Milton? Along with his resignation, he agreed to relinquish $166 million of equity and a two-year $20 million consulting contract. However, Milton gets to possess $3.1 billion in stock due to a recently finalized separation agreement. He agreed to assist the corporation as an unpaid consultant, but his role in company operations and decision-making are paused for at least three years. In the aftermath of Milton’s resignation, Nikola’s shares decreased significantly in premarket trading, opening Monday, September 21st, at $24.97, the lowest opening price since the company went public in June. It ended the day, closing down 19% at $27.58. As he continues to defend himself against the Hindenburg Research report, Milton’s legal expenses are paid for by Nikola as long as they receive copies of evidence.

With Milton out of the picture, Stephen Girsky has been appointed chairman of the board. General Motors’ main priority is to plan production of the battery-powered Badger truck starting late 2021 or early 2022, ultimately continuing the partnership with Nikola. Although General Motors bears the responsibility for its creation, Nikola will remain in charge of marketing and selling the product upon its release. Because Nikola lacks the cushion of intellectual property and revenue, they heavily rely on the investor’s contribution through the stock market. Nikola’s tarnished reputation requires damage control in order to maintain enough revenue until the Badger is released.

UPDATE: Now that time has passed from Nikola’s public fraud incident, the aftermath has unraveled. As of Monday, November 30th, 2020, General Motors decided to remove themselves from their deal with Nikola, thus relinquishing their $11 million equity stake. Because Nikola failed to live up to their “fast-paced” evolution of electric and hybrid vehicles, General Motors believed it was in their best interest to maintain distance for their future business ventures. Since the manufacture of Nikola’s hydrogen-powered Badger pickup truck relied on a partnership with an automaker, the vehicle’s production has been paused. According to The Verge, the two companies will cooperate to bring, “GM’s Hydrotec fuel-cell technology into Nikola’s Class 7 and Class 8 zero-emission semi-trucks for the medium- and long-haul trucking sectors.” With Nikola partly out of the picture, General Motors can focus on their multi-billion-dollar pursuit for a future involving all-electric vehicles. This requires the automaker to invest $2.2 billion to reconfigure their vehicle assembly plant and create the development process for its modular battery-electric platform, Ultium. They announced last week their $2.2 billion electrification investment will become $27 billion through 2025.  

UPDATE – 07/29/2021

We sort of knew it was coming. The grand jury had been convened. Mr. Milton had a lot of very public statements that were likely false or misleading. So, it was no surprise today when the grand jury indicted him on three counts of fraud. Here’s an update on the matter from CNBC.

AutomotiveEngineeringExpert Witness

Tesla Whistleblower Alleges Inflated Production, Safety Hazards

on July 12, 2018

Former Tesla employee Martin Tripp has blown the whistle accusing the company of what may be securities fraud peppered with dangerous safety concerns.

This is an update on our last post: Tesla Trade Secrets Lawsuit: Investigators & Expert Witnesses.

It seems this story is just heating up. Once again, Cyrus Farivar from Ars Technica, is doing some excellent reporting on this story and I only hope to follow in his footsteps with my own expert witness-based input.

Last Friday, former Tesla employee Martin Tripp, submitted a whistleblower tip to the SEC. According to Mr. Farivar’s reporting, Tripp did so using a “TCR” (tip, complaint, or referral form). Mr. Tripp is now represented by a lawyer specialized in whistleblower cases. Interestingly enough, he still is not represented by counsel in the Tesla trade secrets lawsuit filed against him and his lawyer on the whistleblower claim does not represent him in that suit.

CNN Money has some details of what is alleged in the claim to the SEC. Tripp alleges that Tesla regularly inflates productions numbers on the Model 3, meaning fewer than the supposed 5,000 vehicles a week are actually being produced. He further contends car batteries are defective because they contain dangerous punctures and Tesla had decreased vehicle safety specifications, all of which increases the likelihood of battery explosions and safety hazards.

If any of the above allegations are true, we are entering into the arena where the following expert witnesses may be needed in a whistle-blower litigation by the SEC.

Securities Fraud:

If Tesla is actually inflating number of vehicles produced and claiming they are meeting their production goals, they could be dealing with some securities fraud issues in addition to opening themselves up to a potential shareholder lawsuit. Claiming they’d be building 5,000 Model 3‘s each week, but not doing so, could be seen by the SEC as an attempt to manipulate the stock price and lie to shareholders, to which the directors and officers of the company owe a fiduciary duty. If this is the case, I expect to see reports from experts in director and officer liability and corporate governance.

Automotive Safety & Engineering:

If there are issues of defective or damaged car batteries being installed in the automobiles, the SEC will need experts to investigate, inspect, and report the validity of these claims. I’m going to avoid the classic product liability issues that may stem from these allegations since those would be involved in a different lawsuit.

However, the SEC will have to employ automotive safety and automotive engineering specialists to determine the legitimacy of Mr. Tripp’s claims. Is he making claims maliciously because he’s a disgruntled former employee? Or, are the batteries and the vehicles truly dangerous?

Another expert likely to be needed to test Mr. Tripp’s accusations would be a specialist in battery engineering. The big selling point for Tesla… the cars are sleek and environmentally friendly because they are electric (battery powered). However, Tripp alleges there are dangerous holes in the batteries.

If you’re like me, you know very little about the inner-workings of your automobile. I do know that a hole in a battery is not good, but the SEC can’t have me do a once over and let them know if the “holes” Mr. Tripp saw are truly dangerous. A battery expert will have to inspect a sample of Tesla car batteries to determine any legitimacy to his claims.

That’s the latest in this ongoing drama. I expect, however, we will be seeing more on the trade secrets matter, whistle-blowing matter, and any counter claims that may be filed. Until then…

Business ValuationExpert WitnessLitigationSecurities

SEC Charges Theranos CEO with Massive Fraud – Securities Expert Witnesses

on March 14, 2018

Once considered “The Next Steve Jobs” or the “female Steve Jobs,” Elizabeth Holmes has fallen from grace and landed directly in the cross-hairs of the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). Today, the SEC filed a civil complaint against Elizabeth Holmes and her company Theranos, Inc. There was a separate action filed against the Chief Operating Officer, Ramesh “Sunny” Balwani.

The complaint alleges, in part:

“Holmes, Balwani, and Theranos raised more than $700 million from late 2013 to 2015 while deceiving investors by making it appear as if Theranos had successfully developed a commercially-ready portable blood analyzer that could perform a full range of laboratory tests from a small sample of blood. They deceived investors by, among other things, making false and misleading statements to the media, hosting misleading technology demonstrations, and overstating the extent of Theranos’ relationships with commercial partners and government entities, to whom they had also made misrepresentations.”

Oh the good old torts of negligent and intentional fraud and misrepresentation. Takes me right back to the first year of law school, when Nickelback was a hot new band, rather than the sad punchline of Internet memes. I digress.

The complaint goes on to allege that based on representations, investors believed Theranos had developed a proprietary medical device able to conduct comprehensive diagnostic tests from a small amount of blood taken from the patients’ finger. They also made representations that they would collect and transport these samples in order to complete the tests on their proprietary analyzer. All of this would be done more efficiently and economically than traditional blood testing labs.

According to the complaint, Theranos was only able to perform about 12 of the 200 tests they claimed they were capable of performing.

Let’s stop here and give a simple warning: If you are soliciting money from investors, make it very clear what you are able to achieve. Differentiate this from what you hope to achieve in the future. Do not mix the two. Otherwise you get into a bad area called misrepresentation, or in this case, securities fraud.

A wide variety of expert witnesses:

In complex civil litigation such as this, there is room for a wide variety of different experts. I can only imagine the SEC and Theranos are both using consulting experts at this time in preparation for a long drawn out litigation. The complaint has only been filed today, so expert disclosures are a way off. Here are a few types of expert witnesses or consulting experts I expect to see in this matter.

Corporate Governance:

Expert witnesses on corporate governance are highly likely to play a role in this case. Officers of a corporation are fiduciaries of the corporation. Holmes owed a duty of care to the company and to her investors. She is accused of misrepresentation which, if proven, would certainly violate the standard of care owed to shareholders and the company. I expect there will be significant dispute by the parties to prove she either did or did not violate her fiduciary duties.

Securities & Finance:

Several different types of experts who practice in the area of securities fraud may come into play. We are likely to see experienced Wall Street experts with a history in equity trading, proprietary trading, investment research, securities valuation, financial forecasting, venture capital and investment banking.

Some experts will probably have backgrounds in IPO’s, private equity financing, securities financing, and stock options financing.

In this area, I feel as though I can go on ad infinitum. That’s not true and it is probable one or two candidates will have the requisite expertise, described in this section, to address the finance and fraud related matters.

Economics:

Although the SEC is primarily suing for injunctive relief, they do mention the potential for civil monetary penalties. I would expect there will be some need for an economist (by both parties) to establish the value of Theranos and shares owned by Holmes and Balwani.

As I do not practice securities litigation and this is not a law review article, it is possible the civil penalties are predetermined by the Securities Act and there is no need to value the penalties other than by the trier of fact.

UPDATE:

Within hours of writing this blog post, I discovered that Elizabeth Holmes has settled with the SEC. According to Reuters, she will be stripped of her majority control of the company and will have to return millions of shares to Theranos. She will also pay a $500,000 fine and be barred from being an officer or director of a public company for 10 years. As of this update, Mr. Balwani has not settled with the SEC.