I feel the same way about UBS. Sold me these things and then quit supporting them. Bet they got there money out before exiting the auction stage.

I also have money in ARS accounts at Merrill Lynch. Is there any investment banker that was not involved in this fraud? If so I will transfer my money there immedieately. Please advise.

I'm in the same boat too. Only thing I'd say is which firm are we suppose to move our money to, they're all culprits. They'll just be a rearrangement of deck chairs amongst clients of different firms. Just today Citigroup was sued, UBS, Deutsche Bank, Morgan Stanley, Merrill Lynch etc...all have screwed up and none of them did their fiduciary responsibility of warning their clients of the potential risks.

I explicitly asked for any sort of risks and was never warned of this and lots of these transactions happened in phone conversations so where's the chance to get a prospectus to read. I've read that Goldman Sachs is quietly working out this problem for their top level executives stuck in them and also their super rich clients. As for us low on the totem pole clients, forget it don't expect any sort of resolution any time soon from any of these firms.

Thank's Peter for your continued writing about this mess. We're all screaming for help....and few seem to be listening.

ARPS investors may want to visit us on Peter's other column....the link is above in the second paragraph.

Peter, here are few alternatives I am using to move my acount from UBS:

1) Interactive Brokerage -
one of the cheapest rates in the world and
NO SUBPRIME / ARS exposure

2) Scott Securities -
little bit more expensive but
NO SUBPRIME / ARS exposure

"Walking with one's feet" is a long standing American tradition and this is exactly what we should do. I don't want UBS making money off me after they threw me under the bus.

I'm leaving my ARS with UBS,
as a constant reminder of what once was a dream to have acount.

I hope you don't mind me linking this article at
http://ARSclassAction.com
so everybody can follow your ideas.

I am off the phone with my UBS FA. Tomorrow when you open your online statement, you will see your ARS "marked to market". I suggest everybody brace yourself.

Now I know understand why Truman had a shot of Whisky before breakfast.

I have an $19,000,000. account with Merrill . If they do not buy the ARPS back from me at par in a very short period of time I will move my entire account. I have friends who have accounts at Merrill that feel the same way. I don't know the value of the other accounts trapped in ARPS nationwide but it has to be hundreds of millions or more. The value of those Merrill accounts holding ARPS is substantially more than that.

Merrill has many of their high net worth clients in these. These clients are supposedly the backbone of their retail business and their retail business is supposed to be one of their strengths. Well they shot themselves in the foot when they walked away from the auctions and as Bill Gross stated left their best clients with the old maid card when their clients didn't even know they were playing old maid.

This was not a "market event"as some have stated. I believe Merrill knew exactly what they were doing but did not fully understand how negative the impact would be. One question I would really like to know is how much Merrill still has in their inventory of these securities. Did they unload it all to their clients?

I think you are going to see a mass exodus of clients as a result of this very poor business decision by someone at the top of Merrill--hopefully it wasn't John Thain. He now has his work cut out for him to try and keep the client base from defecting. The loss of clients is going to hurt and once they are gone they won't be coming back---ever. When the statements come out this month end and those ARPS are not valued at par the stampede will begin.

We're stuck with $600,000 of ARS. Merril started cramming them into our account in October. Everytime we sold stock they put it in ARS. When I finally noticed a big purchase in January in our February statement I told them to sell. The broker was away for a couple of days including a Valentine dinner. No doubt he was avoiding us. We were looking for a good money market rate and now we're stock holders in a hedge fund!!! Yes hedge fund, who do you think these ARS companies are? We've already pulled our money out and are seeking legal counsel.

We're stuck with $600,000 of ARS. Merril started cramming them into our account in October. Everytime we sold stock they put it in ARS. When I finally noticed a big purchase in January in our February statement I told them to sell. The broker was away for a couple of days including a Valentine dinner. No doubt he was avoiding us. We were looking for a good money market rate and now we're stock holders in a hedge fund!!! Yes hedge fund, who do you think these ARS companies are? We've already pulled our money out and are seeking legal counsel.

I heard from several sources about the booklet for ML brokers urging them to put their clients in ARS rather than in the Money Markets.

I made an offer to buy the booklet.
http://arsclassaction.com/#ML
In 24 hours I got only one offer. Let's see what weekend brings.

Merrill Lynch ARS information. Note page 3 the second paragaph-"ARS are Money Market Type Securities."

http://www.ml.com/media/70501.pdf

I am a long term financial advisor for a major firm (I cannot name at this time) and to my dismay have placed several millions of clients' funds, including my own funds in auction rate securities. I was totally unaware of the liquidity risks until the auctions began to fail. It was my mistaken belief that closed end funds would adjust rates upward to create demand to keep the auctions going OR deleverage to retire the ARS as necessary to provide auction support. No one that I know was aware that the so called "penalty rates" were were set unbelievably low to protect the issuing CEFs.
If immediate action is not taken by my industry or the CEFs involved, I will never again buy either the common or preferred shares of any CEF. I consider this situation to be a betrayal of trust.

DONT TRUST EVEN E*TRADE, SCHWAB, OR AMERITRADE.. they are the equivalent pond scum as the big boys.... all whores.
Schwab even has more lawsuits over several proprietary Schwab bond funds theie brokers hyped over the past couple years that are down 20%-30% just since October. They lied and said there were no CDO's or HELO's in them, NOT, I knew Schwab was scum also, and transferred to E*Trade and still got frocked like a choir boy.into 1/4 of ARS on a solicited trade last December
(note Ameritrade cannot even find an $1000.00 ACH transaction ) of mine made in January, least of my worries.
TRUST NONE OF THEM !! CASH OUT WHEN YOU CAN AND PUT YOUR MONEY IN PHYSICAL EUROS, CANADIAN DOLLARS, SILVER BULLION, GOLD, SILVER COINS, PALLADIUM AND PLATINUM BULLION, AND RARE COINS WITH A BIG PERSONAL SAFE WITH A BIG DOBERMAN TO GUARD IT.
This American financial system is a house of cards run by gypsies, tramps, and thieves.

Dear Sirge Birbrair, if you get a copy of that book, I think it will be of great interest to the Securities Division of the Massachusetts Secretary of State. You should also look at what happened with Apollo Group, which has close connections with Merrill.

I have the same problem. I have 7 figures tied up in ARPS that Merrill Lynch sold me. They told me this was cash equivalent in my money market.

I've transferred my account to another AAA rated bank; I don't want to be in Merrill Lynch when the next shoe drops. Why not transfer your ARPS now, why wait until there is a run on Merrill Lynch and other Brokerage firms.

These firms deserve everything they get!

I have the same problem. I have 7 figures tied up in ARPS that Merrill Lynch sold me. They told me this was cash equivalent in my money market.

I've transferred my account to another AAA rated bank; I don't want to be in Merrill Lynch when the next shoes drops. Why not transfer your ARPS now, why wait until there is a run on Merrill Lynch and other brokerage firms.

These brokerage firms deserve everything they get!

Everyone here should move over to the neighboring blog where there is a wealth of information including a number of smoking guns from UBS, Merrill, Nuveen.
http://www.bloggingstocks.com/2008/02/27/when-the-collapsed-auction-rate-securities-ars-market-gets-per/61

I am also posting the direct dial phone numbers for the SEC attorneys who are investigating ARS. Even if you have already emailed SEC enforcement, call these people, and ask to give verbal sworn testimony against your brokerage.

Ken Lench: 202 551 4938
Bonnie Kartzman: 202 551 4824

These are the same team that caught the 13 brokerages in 2006. They understand the background. What they need to understand now, & haven't quite grasped, is that hundreds of thousands of retail investors are absolutely suffering, not just financially, but physically and psychologically, because of an out and out deception.

I do have it from a reliable source that Mr. Lench, bless him, says he wants to help any investor out there hurt in ARS.

At first the SEC asked me just to give out the email address, afraid of too many calls. But with the UBS haircuts, et al., this is just getting too dire. If the SEC's phone rings off the hook about this, then it is meant to be so. It is their job; we pay their salaries. And BTW let's give them the smoking guns.
Can they get us our money back? Tough question. But when I hear Nuveen struggling, presumably in good faith, with finding a way to restructure nontaxable ARPS (& not sounding all that optimistic, truly) I've got to hope that maybe a little regulatory help from the SEC could fashion a solution (as it did in the municipals buying back their own issues.) And when I know the brokerages are digging in their heels and refusing to rescind frozen transactions they represented to be riskless, not to mention devaluing the monies they wrongfully hold hostage, I can't help but wonder if a strenuous SEC investigation might not have some influence in changing their course.

I am still ALL FOR everyone consulting private counsel by the way, & I am pursuing the class action route (which will go slowly, slowly) because I believe in taking every possible line of attack and pressuring all wrongdoers. All can be done simultaneously now. No class has been certified, no one has to decide to opt in or out.

But back to the SEC. Forget the email address guys. Ring the SEC phones off the hook.
Serge, can you post the phone numbers?

Just an FYI - We talked to UBS today - we were told that they own $11B of this on their B/S and that they are estimating that ML has $24B. The issue is that when / if the issuers start finding
solutions, you can bet your 7 figures won't get in line before their 11!

Also, several of you referenced leaving the big firms. Where are you going. It seems like everyone is involved in this thing.

Serge,

Did you ever get the booklet
on the ML brokers? If so I'd love to get a copy of it! They are ruthless!

I'm out $100,000 from UBS..my financial adviser is a good one but I wish he would have intervened in January 2008 when I gather this problem started..I would definitely have taken my money out of the 7 day paper (like cash) Illinois Student Assist Loan Arc that I was put into...I cannot afford to lose that much money as my portfolio is not a huge one and I need this in our retirement right now..is anyone else getting screwed with these Arcs? these involve student loans...why isn't our government stepping in? students are still applying for these grants...am I being naive or is this wrong?
My FA sais I will not lose a penny of my money but I already am..plus a footnote that was sent with my monthly statment assured me that I would still receive the interest on my money monthly even if the Arc was frozen...isn't that being deceitful? I truly feel like I was robbed...Hurt in RI