It seems that the Federal Bureau of Investigations (FBI) in the United States has been monitoring the activities of officials from Venezuela’s National Securities Commission, particularly a certain Rafael Ramos. Ramos, who was appointed as the overseer of UnoValores Casa de Bolsa on February 26, 2010, by Tomas Sanchez undefined, the National Superintendent of Securities (according to Official Gazette number 39,375), has just been arrested by the FBI in Miami for being involved in an extortion attempt undefined.
Tomas Sanchez, Ramos’s boss, who is believed to be the ringleader of extortionists operating within the National Securities Commission, has publicly addressed the legal issues he is facing in the U.S. He claims that there are attempts to involve the regime of Hugo Chavez in this extortion case. Sanchez goes so far as to state that Ramos is not a public official, even though he himself signed the act published in the aforementioned Official Gazette number 39,375. In fact, a Google search for Rafael Ramos on the site of the National Securities Commission of Venezuela shows that Ramos has been designated as an overseer by Sanchez on numerous occasions undefined.
Expert sources from Venezuela report that overseers appointed by Sanchez come in, assign themselves salaries, and hire personnel at the expense of the companies they oversee. They investigate movable properties, vehicles, etc., which, if they are to the ‘overseers” liking, are the first things they seize. A total of 45 brokerage firms have been intervened in Venezuela. Ramos’s relatives have been involved in interventions of brokerage firms and financial entities.
Econoinvest, with an estimated value of around 100 million dollars, is being liquidated without any legal recourse. UnoValores Casa de Bolsa has been under intervention since January. It turns out that its owner was being extorted by Sanchez and Ramos.
Out of the 45 entities intervened by the National Securities Commission, only one, GlobalCorp, for which Ramos was also appointed as overseer undefined, has managed to resolve its situation. In intervention processes, the National Securities Commission has refused to respond to legal remedies presented by interested parties. The arrest of Ramos in Florida for extortion shows that the application of law is not precisely the principle that prevails in cases of intervention of financial entities by the National Securities Commission of Venezuela.