Thank you to commenter, Mr. Bennett Benevolent Society, for providing a link to a report on China Shen Zhou Mining (SHZ), available here, which showed that not only did the mulleted one, Gene Michael, lie about his UMich law degree, but he also lied about working for Grant Thornton.
Today, SHZ issued a “Letter to Shareholders” where the company attempted to rebut some of the report’s claims. In the letter, available here, the company basically admits that Gene lied on his resume, and therefore in multiple filings. He never worked for Grant Thornton at all, instead he worked for a small firm called Gerbel and Butzbaugh CPAs. According to SHZ:
Mr. Gene Michael Bennett worked for Gerbel and Butzbaugh CPAs in Michigan and this firm was negotiating to be merged into Alexander Grant, which later became Grant Thornton. All records are being corrected to show only Gerbel and Butzbaugh CPAs for clarification.
It seems that Mr. Corporate Governance Audit Committee Chairperson does not know, or understand, the difference between working for a company, and working for a company that was “negotiating” to be acquired by a company that EVENTUALLY became a more famous name?
Not quite the same thing, now is it?
Grant Thornton’s own history page, makes no mention at all of Gerbel either. Your author is so surprised.
By the way, has anyone else noticed that both SHZ and sister GMB company China Agritech (CAGC) use the exact same IR guy? Perhaps Kevin Theiss and his IR firm, Grayling, should get a thorough Edgaring and Google-ing sometime soon.
Grayling sounds like a project for next week!
And in other news, Seeking Alpha favorite CCME has been halted since Friday morning but with no news release.
I knew I should’ve hopped on the puts for that one, but the premium (along with the fact that these things can last longer than seems humanly possible) scared me off.