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CB Cryptocurrency Review of Pearl Lee of Janney Montgomery Scott
Pearl Lee of Janney Montgomery Scott

Pearl Lee of Janney Montgomery Scott review: churning and betrayal 8

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Author of the review
2:43 pm EDT
Review updated:

BEWARE of Pearl Lee of Janney Montgomery Scott in Philadelphia, PA. This woman is morally bankrupt and a complete fraud in both her professional and personal life!
In 2005, Pearl Lee Gitter was a financial adviser with Morgan Stanley Dean Witter. At that time, her coworker and future brother-in-law, Steve left Morgan Stanley for another financial firm. Immediately after his departure from Morgan Stanley, Pearl Lee did not hesitate to seize Steve's richest of clients for herself. It may be a common practice for an investment firm to make every effort to retain their clients and convince them to not move with their adviser but for Pearl Lee, it did not morally compute in her head that Steve was FAMILY. Greed took over.
Anyone with an ounce of decency, respect and basic morals would know not to steal, especially from friends and family. But Pearl Lee lack these convictions and got caught. She says she was deeply sorry, regretted it and profusely apologized to Steve and his team of associates.
Because no damage was done, Steve forgave her. The lesson Pearl Lee claimed to have learned, "Never take advantage of family".
Fast forward to 2011, Pearl Lee is now with Janney Montgomery Scott (she left Morgan Stanley brokerage firm in 2006). In 2011, she received a FINRA investigation due to a complaint filed against her.
Who filed it? Her own brother (the closest member of her nuclear family). In the first 4 years with Janney [protected]), she needed to meet her monthly quota and the easiest prey among her clientele list - her own brother. She took advantage of his trust and naivety of the market and made over 140+ unnecessary trades on his small IRA accounts between [protected] - basically decimated his retirement portfolio.
She bought stocks high and sold them low. She bought him long term mutual funds and sold them in less than 6 months. She made his retirement account fluid and would not stop CHURNING - charging over $3000 per year in fees and commissions. And she did all this with no regrets.
When her brother discovered her actions, he confronted her. Unlike her brother-in-law Steve, damage was already done. When given a choice to make restitution or face retribution, she chose money over her own family. This is the very nature, the true colors of Pearl Lee - Selfish Greed!
Her brother reported her to FINRA who agreed to investigate. So to anyone who is a current client or about to use Pearl Lee as their financial adviser, beware and THINK ABOUT THIS. If Pearl Lee is greedy, reckless and completely irresponsible with her own family member's financial portfolio, how do you think she would manage your life savings and investments? She is extremely deceptive and will not learn from the mistakes of her past.
Money is her god! Be forewarned. Pearl Lee has absolutely no integrity and no morals when it comes to money.
Her betrayal deserves nothing but contempt!I would know -
I am her brother!

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8 comments
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mingster2021
Pompano, US
Jan 12, 2023 7:24 pm EST
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I am Pearl Lee's (ex)brother, it has been over 10 years since my face-to-face confrontation with Pearl Lee where she could not rationally explain her churning theft in my retirement portfolio. We are completely estranged. To this day, Pearl Lee will lie and deny she did anything wrong (or most likely refuse to talk about it). As of January 2023, Pearl Lee is still an active Financial Advisor with Janney and I have no doubt she is covertly victimizing her current clients. In order to tell my story of Pearl's defraudment of my retirement account and how Janney is culpable, I authorize and am allowing Complaintsboard to make public Janney's 8/26/2011 response letter to me when I filed my complaint against Pearl Lee with FINRA. I segmented Janney's letter so that I can detail their lack of due diligence, their complicity and their complete failure to comply with their own fiduciary oath. Pearl Lee's management of my retirement portfolio was completely unscrupulous, illegal and far from fiduciary and FINRA's failure to prosecute Pearl Lee was a slap to my face but that's another story. I never got my justice but today, will settle for poetic justice.

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mingster2021
Pompano, US
Jan 14, 2023 8:29 am EST
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Correction: In the attached pic labeled "It is Worth Noting ...", I inadvertently mentioned the Green Mountain Coffee stock came from my Roth IRA. The purchase and sale of this stock actually came from my Traditional IRA. I reposted the pic with the corrections. Pearl Lee's unscrupulous and criminal behavior in both my IRAs and the intent of my message in the post has not changed.

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mingster2021
Pompano, US
Dec 30, 2022 3:15 pm EST
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I am Pearl Lee's ex-brother. I have been posting complaints to warn the public about Pearl Lee, a greedy Financial Advisor with Janney Montgomery Scott in Philadelphia on multiple consumer review and shame websites for many years (about 10 years and counting).

As of year ending 2022, Pearl Lee is still an active employee with Janney. I've always suspected that both Janney and Pearl are aware of these multiple negative reviews posted online but have not heard nor receive any responses of any kind from neither one of them.

Today, I came across a 11/26/2022 post from one of the consumer review sites and it answered many questions. I am elated and feeling vindicated.

Thank you to the anonymous person who shared their experience at Janney.

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Poetic Justice2
Philadelphia, US
Jan 12, 2024 6:28 pm EST

My response to the anonymous Janney employee post from 2022:

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I am Pearl's (ex)brother and thank you for sharing this insight into Janney internal affairs. I've long suspected that both Pearl and Janney are aware of the numerous complaints I have made online against them. Your post confirms that.

Pearl only has one brother, I'm not anonymous and she knows where I live. And yes, after almost 10 years of sharing and shaming Pearl Lee of Janney Montgomery Scott and detailing her corruption online, I have not heard a single word from either one of them.

Pearl's downfall (and probably her biggest regret) was to target and steal from the closest member of her own family, me. Why she did this, only she can explain her own depraved psychology but in my opinion, she is a narcissistic sociopath. She knew I looked up to my big sister, trusted her and never questioned her motives in managing my retirement account. She exploited that trust. I was her perfect victim and she thought she could get away with defrauding my life savings.

IMO, I personally know Pearl Lee cannot and will not come after me with any civil suit, not because she has empathy or have some respect to not traumatize my life any further beyond what she has already done. No, it is because of FEAR. One of Pearl's weaknesses is confrontation; she knows that facing me will be contentious, combative, verbally offensive and her actions in my portfolio will be dissected. Pearl Lee can't handle this scrutiny where she will be under the spotlight, making her a weak and pitiful plaintiff. She chose the easy path to cower, remain silent, ignore the entire situation and hope it goes away. But, for the sake of argument, lets say she finds her ovaries and decide to file a suit, well here's her second fear - she knows it will be very public. The entire Lee/Li/Wen family will know, including her close friends, the women's group at AAWC/PASSI, the Philadelphia Chinatown Christian Church community and all her neighbors. I pretty much know everybody in her life.

Now if Janney would like to get involve in a suit with Pearl, I believe Philadelphia local channel 3, 6 and 10 News, the Philly Inquirer and other news outlets would be interested in this sensational, 'Goliath v. David' story.

In summary, Janney's Human Resources should use Pearl Lee as their real life case study for annual compliance training and new hire orientation for incoming Financial Advisors. Training title could be something like "So you want to betray your Fiduciary Oath and defraud a family member's financial portfolio because you think you can get away with it".

I never got my justice but will settle for poetic justice!

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mingster2021
Pompano, US
Jan 12, 2021 12:15 pm EST
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Picture of the Barstools. Thank you Naomi for revealing the true ugly colors of Pearl Lee!

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mingster2021
Pompano, US
Jan 12, 2021 12:08 pm EST
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This message blog is to the Gitter, Rappoport and Schweitzer family - to all of you who knows Pearl Lee from Philadelphia, PA. This black widow is my sister and was the closest member in my family. I use to look up to her and would never think to hurt, harm nor take advantage of my beloved big sister. That has all changed! Today she is the WORST person in my life!

If you were to asked, how did this all happen?
Our estrangement began in March 2010 after Naomi's death (David's mom). Naomi's Rittenhouse Square condo was being cleared out and Pearl was given first dibs to most of her household furniture and goods. Sidenote: Pearl was elated in getting Naomi's stuff; if Naomi was looking down at this spectacle of a woman, she would be nauseated to see Pearl's greedy, grubby salivating behavior in her condo.
Now Naomi had 3 kitchen highchairs/barstools that Pearl thought would benefit my home since I had a large kitchen island. In fact, Pearl thought it would benefit me SO MUCH that she projected in her head that I would LOVE LOVE LOVE these 3 chairs. When she asked if I wanted them, I said "Sure, Ok". Keep in mind, I already had barstools and was not in the market for additional chairs but since I had a large island, I thought "Why not?!"

On the morning of Sat 3/6/2010, we each drove over to the Rittenhouse Square Condo to retrieve these chairs. There was only a 30-minute parking allowed in front of the building, not a big deal since I can be in and out quickly. Keep in mind, prior to this day, I was NOT aware that Pearl too was collecting stuff for herself. All I knew on this day was that I will be picking up 3 chairs. It took me no more than 10 minutes to grab the 3 chairs and put it in my car. With 20 mins left and being a good brother, I went back into the condo to help Pearl collect and pack the stuff she wanted. In the condo, she was carefully wrapping every object with towels/paper before placing them in boxes and she was directing me to do the same. Given just a 30-minute window, I thought, this is ridiculous to spend the time wrapping everything. The logical side of my brain told Pearl, lets just fill these boxes and move it quickly to her car for this trip. Also the drive from the condo back to her place was about a mile, it is highly unlikely they would be damaged during this short transport.

Finally, we packed her car in 30-min and as we were about to depart to our respective homes, Pearl tells me to meet her back here in one hour to continue packing more stuff. Surprised at her ask, I told her I could not since I already made plans for the rest of the day. I could tell she was astonished at my answer but we got in our cars and left. I didn't give it anymore thought driving home.

When I arrived home, I got this tumultuous call from Pearl. She BERATED me for refusing to help her move. I try effortlessly to explain to her that I was not aware she was collecting stuff and she NEVER asked me to help her move. All I knew was that I was picking up 3 chairs that morning, THAT WAS IT. She would NOT accept my explanation. In not so many words, she reminded me it was because of her that I was the recipient of these "3 beautiful chairs" and I owe her major gratitude. The words that is permanently embedded in my memory, "I THOUGHT OF YOU, I DIDN"T HAVE TO BUT I THOUGHT OF YOU!" and I should have immediately altered my entire day to accommodate her. When she hung up on me, I was floored. I did not know how to react to what just transpired. I was also getting pissed that Pearl did not bothered to asked for my help but basically felt ENTITLED. These 3 barstools are not anything special. I looked them up online and found them to cost less than $100 each. They were also not my personal choice if I was in the market. However, being thankful, I texted the Gitters to thank them for the barstools later that 3/6/2010 evening.

I avoided Pearl for the next few days until my birthday in mid-March. Pearl and David took me out to dinner in the neighborhood and when we returned back to Pearl's home, I see Naomi's furniture in her basement. She basically asserted that I will have to move all these furniture up the stairs because, as she reiterated again, I was the recipient of those barstools which she felt I LOVED LOVED LOVED. WTF? They were plain ole chairs but apparently, Pearl sees them as me receiving an organ transplant and I had to be indebted to her.
By now I was fuming. When I got home, I threw out those chairs, did not want them in my house. Some time later that week, I received a message from Pearl that the Gitters had inquired how I liked those chairs, Pearl's overwhelming response to them - "HE LOVED THEM"! Pearl then tells me to make sure that I thanked the Gitters for the chairs. Seriously?! Only weeks later when she realized I had to thank the Gitters. I was livid but did not respond back.

This event became the CATALYST that opened my memory of Pearl Lee. I started to realized, she has been doing this [censored] my entire adult life. Greedy, Selfish, Self-Serving and Cheap! Everything she had done for me had some sort of pricetag attached. I always owe her and she made sure she got reimbursed. Throughout my entire adult life, she has never been generous to me. She has never been thoughtful or unselfish with her money. She is definitely CHEAP! Pearl Lee can't and won't allow herself to spend money on others but would gladly accept expensive gifts from you with no shame. Her world has always been "Me, Me, Me". She exploited my trust & devotion and had me wrapped around her finger, having me do everything from labor, chauffeur and IT stuff so that she doesn't have to pay for it. And of course, she NEVER reciprocated.

I immediately stopped talking to Pearl and in April 2010, I made the decision to fire Pearl and not let her handle my retirement accounts at Janney. She does not deserve to manage my money and get paid for it. On 4/9/2010, I made an appt with another financial firm to basically open an IRA account. But before I signed the actual papers to authorize the transfer of funds, I felt some respect to at least inform Pearl of what I was about to do. We had not spoken since my birthday dinner and on 4/24/2010, Pearl got wind that I was furious with her. We had our one-on-one talk over the phone Monday 4/26/2010 and this is when I unleashed my fury and accused her for being Greedy, Selfish, Self-Serving and Cheap! I also informed her I was moving my money out of Janney. I signed the papers on 4/28/2010 and my money finally moved out of Janney by 5/12/2010.

What is the point of all this you may ask?
If Pearl Lee was this Greedy, Selfish, Self-Serving, Cheap individual in her own personal life, wouldn't you think this ugly, ugly behavior transcended itself into her professional life? Pearl's modus operandi has always been: if you don't know she is stealing from you, no one gets hurt. She has this uncontrollable impulse to seek out all opportunity to financially gain from you and because she has no ethics nor moral compass, she targets unsuspecting people like friends and family. If she thinks she can get away with it, she'll do it under the cover of secrecy or naivete. She is so cheap, I remember she would make lunch plans and invite specific friends or family who she knows is good with tools, and after lunch, casually ask if he or she can work on or fix something for her so that she doesn't have to go out and pay a professional. It is pathetic and given the fact that Pearl is a millionaire and can afford hired hands, it just adds to her ugliness.

So in 2010, Pearl and I were not talking between mid-March to almost the end of April but on my IRA account, there were 2 unauthorized trades made in April 2010. On 4/21/2010, Pearl sold 100 shares of Green Mountain Coffee at $80.81/share and on the very next day 4/22/2010, she bought all 100 shares back at a higher price of $85.86/share. I never authorized these trades but Pearl had been so brazen in churning my account without consequences through the last 4 years, she had no problem committing this crime. I reported her to FINRA in 2011 when I discovered this a year later. Janney defended the 4/21/2010 as a 'sell order' that Pearl had made awhile back (which I don't recall she ever contacted me about) but Janney made absolutely no comment to the 4/22/2010 purchase. It took FINRA over a year to review my charges and came back with no violations against Pearl in 2012. I called this BS especially the fact that there was nothing fiduciary about this purchase the day after selling it! Clearly the only person who benefitted from these transactions was Pearl. FINRA recommended that I take the route of Arbitration but I decided not to since its been over 2 years since the occurrence and if I did get restitution, it would not be much to cover the financial loss plus the 18 years of investment time with Pearl. So I decided to choose a different route using the World Wide Web to warn and expose the true ugly colors of Pearl Lee.

To the Gitter, Rappoport and Schweitzer family, Pearl Lee is not someone you want to embrace. She is a parasite and commits white collar crimes. She doesn't care about anyone but herself. She only cares about what you can do for her and how she benefits from you. She is deceptive and just plain evil. Money and her assets are the only things important to her. Avoid her. Let her live her final years shunned and alone. Her legacy deserves nothing but contempt and indignation!

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mingster2021
Pompano, US
Jan 12, 2023 7:11 am EST
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Need to make a correction from my 1/12/2021 post. I had written: "Janney defended the 4/21/2010 as a 'sell order' that Pearl had made awhile back (which I don't recall she ever contacted me about) but Janney made absolutely no comment to the 4/22/2010 purchase."

I reread Janney's 8/26/2011 response letter to my complaint I had filed with FINRA against Pearl Lee. I overlooked this response, "The sale was triggered by a stop loss ordered entered twenty days prior on April 1, 2010 and Ms. Lee has explained that after consultation with you the decision was made to repurchase the shares given market conditions." Noticed their lawyer italicized "with".

So basically, it was 2 executed transactions based on one consultation, hence giving Pearl absolute discretion to re-purchase shares whenever she wants, at my expense. Regardless if I find these 2 transactions based on one consultation nefarious, the bottom line is - Pearl Lee did not (I repeat DID NOT) consult with me on this "stop loss order" on April 1, 2010. Pearl Lee committed the crime of Unauthorize Trading and falsely created a narrative that she had 'consulted with me'.

Thursday, April 1, 2010 was less than 2 weeks since my birthday dinner in mid-March (on Fri 3/19/2010) where I saw Pearl had Naomi's furniture in her basement and asserted that I have to move them up the stairs because I was the recipient of those stupid barstools (story from my "Message blog to the Gitter, Rappoport and Schweitzer family").

At and around this April 1 period, I was furious with Pearl, was not talking to her and making plans to transfer all my money out of Janney. If this "consultation" occurred on Thurs, April 1, 2010 (according to Janney's letter), this would have been when Pearl called and left a message to inform me that I needed to thank the Gitters for their barstools. Again, she left a message (a less than 30 second message). We did not have a phone conversation and certainly no discussion about buying/selling of stocks in my account. She deceptively used this call as her "proof" with Janney that she "had a consultation with me about that stop loss order".

Pearl Lee is a White Collar Criminal and must be called out and labeled as such!

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MingL
, US
Aug 17, 2019 12:48 pm EDT

Pearl Lee Gitter of Janney Montgomery Scott in Philadelphia, PA is my sister. I use to be the closest member of her nuclear family! I use to look up to her and would do anything for her and for her happiness. As a close family member, it would never cross my mind to do anything to hurt, harm or take advantage of my big sister, it was just NOT in my nature. Never would I have imagined Greed was COMPLETELY her true colors. Pearl Lee has betrayed me with such reprehensible enormity. Today, I DESPISE everything about this woman.

There are many facets to Pearl Lee's true ugliness, but the bottomline is - she is a Greedy, Lying, Selfish, Self-serving Cheap [censored]! To sum it up, I highlighted Pearl Lee's hubris and betrayal of my Past, Present and Future!

Future - I had invested my savings and transferred ALL my 401Ks to an IRA with Pearl's financial firm for 18 years. The last 4 years with Janney Montgomery Scott [protected]), Pearl had manipulated my trust and CHURNED my retirement account, she had me paying Janney over $3000 every year in fees and commissions. I had 2 small IRA accounts (a traditional and a Roth) that had a total of 140+ trades in 4 years, averaging about 2.5 trades per month. Pearl made both my IRAs fluid and she did not care that she was decimating my retirement portfolio. She would tell me she wants to diversify my portfolio but her hidden and only agenda was to make a commission at my expense. She got greedy and careless and bought stocks high and sold low; she bought me long term mutual funds and sold them in less than 6 months. The total amount of my IRAs in 2010 when I fired Pearl was LESS than when I first opened the accounts in 2006. Needless to say after 18 years, I made more money for Pearl than she did for me. She did not care and did not uphold her promise of fiduciary responsibility for me, her brother and her client.

Present - Every gift, every act of generosity and even "the thought that counts", if Pearl bestowed gifts or attributes upon me, it always came with a price tag. She made sure that I OWE her and that she got paid (by money reimbursement, exchange for something better or by labor - fixing, moving, painting, etc). Any Win-Win between Pearl and I, you can be sure Pearl manipulated a bigger Win. She is the cheapest Millionaire sister - every birthday, Christmas or housewarming gift, you can be sure the amount she had spent on my gift was minimal or it didn't cost her anything. Even petty items that have no value to her but she thought would benefit me, she would try to sell it to me. Pearl never contributes to anyone or anything unless there is some return in her investment - this is how she lives her life. Don't be fooled by her charity or volunteerism, there is no altruistic bone in her body. I have heard someone say "Frugality in a woman is the most unattractive" - this would explain why Pearl never found a mate in her 20's, 30's, 40's and even in her 50's. Needless to say, for Pearl to finally get married in her 60's to someone in his 70's was more a marriage of convenience and less about love (and to finally rid herself of the 'spinster' stigma), but I am fully certain a prenup that benefits her was signed.

Past - Pearl was 17yo when I was born and she kept from me the biggest SECRET about my birth. The knowledge about my adoption (DNA confirmed) lifted a dark cloud of UNANSWERED questions I held my entire life as to why I was so different from everyone in the Lee family and why both my parents were always indifferent to me. Growing up in this dysfunctional family was completely at odds with the cultural "son in a Chinese family" dynamics. This knowledge that I was adopted was a paradigm shift and a cure for my personal self-esteem and Pearl deliberately WITHHELD this medicine from me. When confronted, her pathetic explanation to divert blame had changed from "I never knew, I never put 2-and-2 together" to "I suspected, but everybody suspected". The reason why she never told me is simply, IT DID NOT BENEFIT HER. However, there was more of a possible risk that I may react negatively and turn against her knowing the truth. In the end, the evil part of all this is knowing that this woman had used this secret to her own advantage by manipulating me, obligating the male son in this Chinese family by having me PROMISE to care for her in her senior years since she is childless.

In summary, there is a silver lining to this story!
An old Serbian proverb says - "A greedy person has thieves for children".
It is a BLESSING to the world if that person never reproduced!
Count yourself lucky for never crossing path with this greedy, selfish woman!
The life and memory of Pearl Lee deserves nothing but contempt!

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