Coke

THE FINANCIAL Services Commission (FSC) is pointing fingers at a notable charity organiser, Yvonne Coke, in charge of one of Jamaica's most well-known non-profit entities, placing her at the helm of a serial Ponzi-scheme operation.

Last Monday, the financial services watchdog listed Hands Across Jamaica, Write Vision, E. Partners Private Members Club, Outstretched Hands Limited and Vision Increase SA Corp, all companies owned and operated by Yvonne Coke, as unregulated financial companies.

The FSC said those companies appearing on the blacklist are not licensed or registered to solicit or take funds from members of the public with the promise to pay returns.

At least one of the companies is also suspected of being connected with a major foreign-exchange investment club, which recently crashed.

coke fuming

However, an obviously fuming Coke categorically denies the claims brought against her, stating that none of her companies is dealing in securities, taking deposits, or carrying out any kind of monetary exchange.

"We are certainly not taking any deposits from anywhere, so I don't know why they find it necessary to list us," she said.

Coke is adamant that the FSC is grossly misinformed about the operations of her companies, particularly Hands Across Jamaica, which she says is a not-for-profit organisation dealing solely in charity work.

She told The Sunday Gleaner that she had no idea why the regulator had fingered her companies as Ponzi schemes or unregistered financial schemes, and that this was not the first time it has happened.

However, when contacted, acting executive director of the FSC, George Roper, said the regulator would not list an entity unless it had adequate information that the company was dealing in securities or any other operations which would require that it is first licensed and registered by the FSC.

no information

Roper, said he was not in a position to share any further information on the matter with The Sunday Gleaner.

Checks made by the newspaper revealed that the main entity, Hands Across Jamaica, incorporated in 1994, was registered as a charitable organisation, while two of the remaining three companies, Outstretched Hands Limited and Write Vision Limited, are operating as remittance services and dealers and services organisation.

Both companies were incorporated in January 2008 and February 2006, respectively.

No listing was found for the fourth entity, Vision Increase SA Corp; however, Coke told The Sunday Gleaner that the company was not registered in Jamaica, but in Panama.

She further said Outstretched Hands was initially started as a fund-raising company to solicit donations on behalf of Hands Across Jamaica, but the company never became operational.

"Our intent was to use it as a fund-raising company to help Hands Across Jamaica. It was registered but never got off the ground. It doesn't even have a bank account," Coke said.

She said the company had even written to the FSC to get instructions on the steps necessary to become a regulated entity, but the company never continued with its operations.

"They wrote back to us and told us what we needed, but we never proceeded with it. We never opened a bank account, nothing," she added. "The company never operated, maybe because we had written to them with an enquiry, that's why they put the name there (on the list)," Coke surmised.

publishing company

Coke also said the company Write Vision is a publishing company, which had so far published one book and was in the process of releasing a second edition of that book.

She said she had made this clear to the FSC before, yet the organisation insisted on listing her companies as unregulated schemes.

"I don't know what information they have, but we are not privy to that information. What we have is what we know about our companies," she said.

Coke said previously, the FSC had listed one of her companies under an incorrect name, but she had ignored it.

"I sat down with the director of the FSC when I was about to register the other company and he asked me about it. I asked him what information he had on my company and he said he had got the information off the website. I told him that that couldn't be true because we don't even have a website," she informed The Sunday Gleaner.

fsc apologised

Coke said the FSC later sent her a written apology. "And now they go back and list it again," she said.

The charity organiser, she said, is trying to work with the FSC to see how she can clear her name and save the reputations of her companies.

"I am waiting on a response to an email I sent George Roper asking him what I need to do so they can stop listing my companies," she said. "I don't have the energy to fight this. I am really just focused on what Hands Across Jamaica is really about," Coke added.

athaliah.reynolds@gleanerjm.com