United/American puts

[yodermon]

from the commission report:

A single U.S.-based institutional investor with no conceivable ties to al Qaeda purchased 95% of the UAL puts on September 6 as part of a trading strategy that also included buying 115,000 shares of American on September 10... much of the seemingly suspicious trading in American on September 10 was traced to a specific U.S.-based options trading newsletter, faxed to its subscribers on Sunday, September 9, that recommended these trades

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/September_11_attacks_advance-knowledge_debate#Insider_trading

Ok, so
1) has the "single U.S.-based institutional investor" ever been identified?
2) has the "specific U.S.-based options trading newsletter" ever been identified, and are there copies anywhere?

[mrarundale]

1. SEC report

Sounds like the newsletter was "Options Hotline" out of California (scroll down to about page 8). Lots of other stuff here:

http://www.scribd.com/doc/30789672/SEC-Report-Pre-September-11-2001-Trading-Review

I'll leave out my "creative speculation"

[gyroscope]

2. Alvin Krongard

this guy was executive director of the CIA when 9/11 happened.

before his position at the CIA, Krongard was head of the investment bank Alex Brown.
Alex Brown happens to be the firm that executed the timely put options.

I would say it was Krongard. He should be the prime suspect.

[deconstruct911]

4. Seems like the best place to start

Mayo Shattuck was also close to Bush & Cheney.

http://www.nytimes.com/2001/09/15/business/chief-steps-down-at-alex-brown.html

[gyroscope]

5. Alex Brown & Sons

...headed by Alvin Krongard, one of the banks named by Senator Carl Levin as being linked to drug money laundering.

...after his stint at the CIA in which he was appointed executive director by the Bush crime family, Krongard joined the infamous Blackwater as a member of their advisory board.

...millions in airline put option profits could not be claimed because the investor did not anticipate the New York Stock Exchange would be shut down for four days after the 9/11 attacks.

...In 2007, House Oversight Committee chairman Henry Waxman charged his brother Howard Krongard (also appointed by Bush, as State Inspector General) with actively impeding probes into waste and corruption related to the war in Iraq and other matters including the infamous Blackwater massacre. In a followup letter Waxman informed Krongard that allegations of witness intimidation had been made against Krongard's staff. Krongard allegedly made threats to State department personnel and whistleblowers if they cooperated with House Oversight Committee investigations. I wonder if he threatened to have his CIA brother take them out?

...it goes on and on. you can't make this stuff up.
these Krongard brothers are as crooked as they come.

[deconstruct911]

6. Deutsche Bank in general...

#1 counterpart in 9/11 financially. MCR had interesting *speculation* in his book on Shattuck and 9/11. Fortunately for him there is a nicer public image:

Updated: July 31, 2006, 12:55 AM ET

NFL's Goodell among five after commish job

"The other three finalists are Frederick Nance, a Cleveland lawyer; Robert L. Reynolds, of Concord, Mass., the vice chairman and chief operating officer of Fidelity Investments; and Mayo A. Shattuck III of Baltimore, chairman of the board, president and CEO of Constellation Energy.
Shattuck's contact with the NFL: His wife, Molly, who is 39, made the Baltimore Ravens' cheerleading squad for the second straight year this season."
http://sports.espn.go.com/nfl/news/story?id=2534601

Mayo Shattuck III — another clue

Mayo Shattuck III is an extremely powerful and
influential mover and shaker in the financial world.
As head of the Alex. Brown unit of Deutsche Bank
on 9/11, he had previously been involved in deals
with Russian ruble trading, Microsoft, the
Bronfman dynasty, Enron (where he assisted in
deceptively concealing Enron’s debts36), and with
a massive insider trading scandal involving Adnan
Khashoggi’s Genesis Intermedia right before
9/11.37 He was midway through a three-year, 30-
million dollar contract as the head of the Alex.
Brown unit of Deutsche Bank when the attacks
came. Shattuck (who knows Buzzy Krongard well)
took over Alex. Brown operations after Krongard
had officially gone to the CIA in 1998. It was under
Shattuck’s management that some of the criminal
trades on United Air Lines were placed right before
9/11.
Mayo Shattuck resigned suddenly on September
12th, the day after the attacks.38 A close associate
of CFR powerhouses like Peter G. Petersen and
Steven Bechtel of the Bechtel Corporation, Shattuck
is today the President and CEO of Constellation
Energy Group, one of the firms that gained
access to Vice President Dick Cheney’s energy
task force, the one from which the Bush administration
is unconstitutionally refusing to release the
records.
Alex. Brown also played a key role in refinancing
the Carlyle Group for its acquisition of United Defense
Technologies in 2000.39 This close connection
to Bush family business ventures is not a surprise
because Alex. Brown’s connections to the
Bush family stretch back for at least seven decades.
The Alex. Brown investment bank helped to
finance and organize the firm managed in the first
half of the 20th century by George W. Bush’s
grandfather, Prescott Bush: Brown Brothers, Harriman.
2

[deconstruct911]

3. This is all I can find on the airline puts

"Sources tell 60 Minutes that the initial options were bought through at least two brokerage firms including NFS, a subsidiary of Fidelity Brokerage, and TD Waterhouse, a discount firm.

TD Waterhouse says they handled approximately 3 percent of the initial orders for "puts" on American Airline stock. The company says it has looked at the orders and has determined no evidence of any suspicious activity."

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2001/09/19/eveningnews/main311834.shtml

"The source familiar with the United trades identified Deutsche Banc Alex. Brown, the American investment banking arm of German giant Deutsche Bank, as the investment bank used to purchase at least some of the options. Rohini Pragasam, a bank spokeswoman, declined comment."

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2001/09/29/MN186128.DTL&ao=2#ixzz1gTI4ti50

This one is more specific but it looks like it is directly off MCR's Oct 9/01 report almost a week prior:

"Further details of the futures trades that netted such huge gains in the wake of the hijackings have been disclosed. To the embarrassment of investigators, it has also emerged that the firm used to buy many of the "put" options – where a trader, in effect, bets on a share price fall – on United Airlines stock was headed until 1998 by "Buzzy" Krongard, now executive director of the CIA.

Until 1997, Mr Krongard was chairman of Alex Brown Inc, America's oldest investment banking firm. Alex Brown was acquired by Bankers Trust, which in turn was bought by Deutsche Bank. His last post before resigning to take his senior role in the CIA was to head Bankers Trust – Alex Brown's private client business, dealing with the accounts and investments of wealthy customers around the world."

http://911review.org/Wget/news.independent.co.uk/insider.html
(Can't find original link to the independent)

business line reported the same:
http://www.thehindubusinessline.in/2002/02/11/stories/2002021100100900.htm

Nothing conclusive on who the 95% investor was. The "FBI Briefing on Trading" MFR goes on and on about market pessimism. Mentions nothing about banks,traders etc. Now those answers were destroyed by the SEC a while ago.