BEVERLY HILLS — A former Beverly Hills stockbroker who partnered with a fugitive hedge fund manager was sentenced Monday, July 6 to serve six years in prison for a stock manipulation conspiracy that cost investors over $200 million.

Todd Michael Ficeto is found guilty in criminal charges linked to a scheme to increase profits of hedge funds. According to the U.S. Attorney’s Office, Todd Ficeto is to serve five years on supervised release after getting out of prison and paying restitution of approximately $216 million. Ficeto was convicted previously in Los Angeles for 18 federal criminal charges including conspiracy, fraud, money laundering, embezzlement and more. The defense attorneys argued for a term of home detention due to the coronavirus pandemic; the request was denied.

Ficeto lived most recently in Marion, Ohio and was a former president of a Beverly Hills–based firm called Hunter World Markets on Wilshire Boulevard. He co-owned the company with Florian Wilhelm Jürgen Homm, a fugitive who was prosecuted in March 2013 for securities and wire fraud.

Homm and Wilhelm took part in a global conspiracy to inflate the price of penny stocks that were sold to hedge funds, which resulted in a large amount of profits. Homm was also the founder of Absolute Capital Management Holdings which was a Cayman Island-based consultant that operated from Spain and controlled eight hedge funds (the Absolute Funds). The Absolute Funds was purchasing the billions of shares of the “penny stocks” through Hunter World Markets, Inc. which was traced by Ficeto and brought to Homm over invest banking deals.

Ficeto helped the manipulated stock purchases go through and caused millions of shares of the same penny stocks to be shared between Homm, Hunter World Markets, and CIC Global Capital, which was controlled by Colin and Craig Heatherington. Colin is allegedly situated in Canada while Craig is believed to be in Australia.

Homm was initially taken into custody at Uffizi Gallery in Florence, Italy by a provisional arrest warrant filed by federal prosecutors in Los Angeles. According to the prosecutors, he was released before he could be extradited to Los Angeles and is alleged to have fled to Germany where he still remains a fugitive.