NEW YORK, April 18, 2006 (PRIMEZONE) -- The Securities Arbitration Law Firm of Klayman & Toskes, P.A. ("K&T") (http://www.nasd-law.com), representing numerous high net-worth investors throughout the nation, advises all Salomon Smith Barney ("Smith Barney") n/k/a Citigroup Global Markets, Inc. customers who are eligible to participate in the Settlement of the Smith Barney Guided Portfolio Management Account Class Action ("Class Action") (W. Caffey Norman, III, et al. v. Salomon Smith Barney, No. 03 Civ. 4391 (GEL)), that they have until April 21, 2006 to opt-out of the Class Action.
K&T strongly encourages all customers who maintained a GPM account to consider securities arbitration as an alternative means to recovering their financial losses. Empirical evidence shows that investors may achieve an overall higher rate of recovery by filing an individual securities arbitration claim.
According to the allegations in the Class Action, Smith Barney's equity ratings for several stocks were improperly influenced in order to obtain profitable investment banking business from the companies whose stock was being covered by Smith Barney. Moreover, during this same time period, Smith Barney's financial advisors could only purchase for GPM accounts those stocks that were given favorable ratings by Smith Barney's Research Department, which included:
1. Sprint n/k/a Sprint Nextel Corp. (NYSE:S) 2. US LEC Corp. (Nasdaq:CLEC) 3. Verizon (NYSE:VZ)
As a result of Smith Barney's issuance of unsubstantiated favorable stock ratings, the firm failed to provide account management services based on objective research in accordance with Smith Barney's contractual and fiduciary duties.
As such, K&T plans to assist individual investors who maintained GPM accounts with Smith Barney to recover their financial losses in securities arbitration claims before the National Association of Securities Dealers and the New York Stock Exchange. K&T strongly encourages all class members of the Smith Barney Guided Portfolio Management Account Class Action to contact Lawrence L. Klayman, Esquire, at 888-997-9956 to discuss their legal options and/or the possibility of pursuing an individual securities arbitration claim. You may also visit us on the web at http://www.nasd-law.com.