CFTC News Release 4433-00 (CFTC Docket 00-26)

For Release August 7, 2000

CFTC FILES AND SETTLES ENFORCEMENT ACTION AGAINST REGISTRANTS JOSEPH FRAITES, MICHAEL MARTIN, MARK MUELLER, AND ALFRED ZAMOJCIN IN CASE INVOLVING THE FAILURE TO OBTAIN AND RECORD ACCOUNT IDENTIFICATION IMMEDIATELY UPON RECEIPT OF CUSTOMER ORDERS

The CFTC Order Imposes Civil Monetary Penalties Aggregating $35,000 and Restricts Respondents' Registrations

WASHINGTON -- The Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) announced today that it issued an order filing and simultaneously settling an administrative proceeding against Joseph Fraites of Weston, Connecticut, Michael Martin of Edison, New Jersey, Mark Mueller of Morristown, New Jersey, and Alfred Zamojcin of Floral Park, New York.

The CFTC order finds that for nearly two years, while working as associated persons (APs) of the same futures commission merchant (FCM) in New York City, the four respondents aided and abetted recordkeeping violations by the FCM by 1) failing to obtain and record account identification on office order tickets at the time orders were received, 2) recording account identification on office order tickets after the order was already received and executed without such identification, and 3) preparing order tickets for trades that had already been executed.

Fraites and Martin are currently registered APs of a registered introducing broker, and Mueller and Zamojcin are registered APs of the FCM.

Without admitting or denying the findings in the CFTC order, Fraites, Martin, Mueller, and Zamojcin consented to the entry of the order finding that from at least June 1995 through February 1997, while handling institutional clients who traded coffee futures contracts and options on coffee futures contracts, Fraites (who ran the FCM�s coffee desk), Martin, and Mueller frequently accepted coffee futures orders for certain customers from a trader, who was trading for two corporate accounts and two individual accounts, without obtaining and recording account identification at the time many of those orders were received. Instead, as the CFTC order finds, upon receipt of each order, they indicated on the office order ticket that the order had been placed by the trader, rather than indicating the specific customer account for which the order had been placed. The order finds that some time after the order was filled, and oftentimes after the close of trading, the trader provided the account identification for the executed trades to one of the respondents, generally Zamojcin, who then recorded the account identification on the partially prepared office order ticket.

According to the CFTC order, respondents knew that account identification was required to be placed immediately on all order tickets at the time the orders were received. As the CFTC order finds, the FCM discovered respondents� activities and informed the CFTC.

Specifically, the CFTC order:

• finds that Fraites, Martin, Mueller, and Zamojcin aided and abetted the FCM�s violations of section 4g of the Commodity Exchange Act (CEA) and section 1.35(a-1)(1) of the Commission's regulations pursuant to section 13(a) of the CEA; and directs them to cease and desist from further such violations;
• imposes civil monetary fines of $15,000 by Fraites, $10,000 by Martin, and $5,000 each by Mueller and Zamojcin; and
• restricts registrations and activities of Fraites for a two-year period, and Martin, Mueller, and Zamojcin for a one-year period each.

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