Awareness of senior financial fraud rises with incidence

While 97% of state securities regulators say there is greater awareness of senior investment fraud and exploitation now than a year ago, almost none report seeing a drop in such cases or complaints, and 29% saw an increase. In fact, 97% of the state regulators surveyed by their trade group, the North American Securities Administrators Association, feel that most cases of senior investment fraud go undetected rather than are discovered before they can cause serious problems. "The clear message is that we need everyone to step up and apply greater resources to stop financial fraud against seniors," said NASAA President and Minnesota Commissioner of Commerce Mike Rothman in a release covering the survey's findings. Three-fourths of respondents surveyed from July 24 to Aug. 4 said they feel broker-dealers and investment advisers can do more to help prevent senior fraud. A NASAA study released in June, which looked at the practices of more than 60 broker-dealers, found that 54% of the responding firms lacked a formal policy defining senior customers, and only 41% had developed a form for customers to identify an emergency or trusted contact person. But NASAA said the previous report also showed that broker-dealers are taking the threat seriously, with just the firms included in that study having reported nearly 2,300 cases concerning possible financial abuse or exploitation of seniors to outside authorities in 2015. The report also found that most senior abuse cases reported (45%) involved customers in the 81-90 year age group, a cohort that regulators overwhelmingly identified as the most vulnerable to financial fraud.