A Pittsburgh area financial advisor will pay $2 million after allegedly stealing from professional athletes to fund movie projects.
Louis Martin Blazer III accepted the fees and industry bar without admitting to the alleged Ponzi-like scheme.
Blazer, partial owner and officer of Blazer Investment Advisors, agreed to settle the SEC’s charges in an administrative proceeding last month, with final judgment handed down by a federal judge in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York on August 4.
According to an SEC complaint filed in 2016, Blazer made unauthorized withdrawals from several client accounts, then allegedly lied and produced false documents afterward to hide the misconduct.
Through Blazer Capital Management, a concierge firm for professional athletes and high-net-worth investors, Blazer allegedly took $2.35 million from five client accounts without authorization to fund two movies, one titled Mafia: The Movie and another called Sibling.
In at least one instance, Blazer allegedly pitched one of the movies to an athlete as an investment opportunity, but the client refused to take part. The SEC claims that Blazer took $550,000 from that client’s account anyway to invest in his film projects.
When the client later demanded repayment after learning about the unauthorized investment, Blazer allegedly took the money from a different athlete’s account to make the repayment in a Ponzi-like fashion.
Blazer has been ordered to pay $1.8 million in disgorgement and interest and a $150,000 civil penalty. In addition, Blazer has agreed to a permanent industry bar from the SEC.