(Reuters) – Anti-fraud police have arrested 110 people in Europe and the United States in an international crackdown on gangs selling bogus shares that cost some investors their life savings, British authorities said on Friday.
City of London Police, responsible for law enforcement in the British capital's financial district, said the arrests, made in a series of raids this week, arose out of a two-year investigation into "boiler room" operations believed to be responsible for millions of pounds of investment fraud.
Boiler rooms consist of teams of young men cold-calling potential investors offering them worthless, overpriced or even non-existent shares using high-pressure sales techniques.