Sabatini and Associates, LLC Attorneys at Law :: Newington :: Hartford :: Connecticut

Investors in Charles Schwab’s ultra-short bond funds the Schwab YieldPlus Fund Investor Shares (Symbol: SWYPX) and the Schwab YieldPlus Fund - Select Shares (Symbol: SWYSX) may be entitled to recover their investment losses. Charles Schwab marketed its YieldPlus funds as safe investments that would provide “higher potential returns than money market funds, with only marginally higher risk.” Charles Schwab also represented that its YieldPlus funds were designed to provide “high current income with minimal changes in share price,” and that this objective would be accomplished by investing in a “well-diversified” portfolio of bonds with durations of one year or less. But the YieldPlus mutual funds have decreased in value by 25% during the first quarter of 2008. That performance is far worse than the performance of money market funds and other ultra-short bond mutual funds during the same period. The funds were over-concentrated in risky mortgage-backed securities that contained subprime mortgage loans. The Funds also invested heavily in collateralized debt obligations. If you lost money in a Schwab YieldPlus fund please contact us for a free case evaluation.

Allstate Insurance has for years kept secret documents on how to low-ball auto claims to keep profits high. Known as the McKinsey documents, they are now being highly sought by Florida insurance investigators who’ve launched a full scale look at the insurance giants rate-making and claims-paying practices. Florida’s Insurance Commissioner Kevin McCarty has suspended Allstate from doing business in the state after the company failed to turn over information on its business practices. An appellate court lifted the ban.  A company spokesman tells the Tampa Tribune that Allstate will turn over the McKinsey documents, but they only concern auto insurance, not homeowners and they contain ideas that never became company policies. The McKinsey documents get their name from the consulting firm McKinsey & Co that Allstate hired in the early 1990s to help draft its business practices. A few lawyers who have sued Allstate have seen them. Most have protective orders from the court guarding the “trade secrets” of Allstate and cannot release them to the public. McKinsey and Co. also allegedly created documents about how to handle homeowners insurance, also highly sought by trial attorneys in property insurance litigation.  The documents have been succesfully used by lawyers in proving bad faith claims against Allstate.  However, the lawyers that have received the documents are under protective orders preventing the disclosure of the documents.

Connecticut business litigation lawyer Vincent Sabatini of Sabatini and Associates, LLC obtained an arbitration award in the amount of $380,000.00. Our client was involved in a business dispute where she was wrongfully terminated from a business where she was also a minority shareholder. Following the arbitration award, the case settled in the amount of $750,000.00. The Connecticut business litigation lawyers at Sabatini and Associates, LLC were not the original lawyers in this case. Prior to the law firm’s involvement, the defendant’s settlement offer was zero. The Hartford based business litigation lawyers at Sabatini and Associates, LLC have a wealth of experience in representing clients involved in business disputes. This case is yet another example of our experience and knowledge achieving results. These past results include an arbitration panel’s award of five million dollars to our client for unpaid commissions. The arbitration award was later confirmed by the Hartford Superior Court.