A NOTE TO OUR SHAREHOLDERS:
On Thursday the Dow
Jones News Service, The Wall Street Journal and New
York Post carried stories about an indictment of some organized
crime figures over an alleged stock manipulation scheme. The Post
story seems to say that this alleged scheme took place in the late
1990s and 2000, but none of the stories made clear when it purportedly
occurred. According to the Journal, one of the stocks mentioned
in the indictment as having been manipulated was Rick’s Cabaret.
We know nothing about these allegations and have had no contact
with the Department of Justice or anyone else on this matter.
After the close of market
on Friday, the Associated Press carried a story that tried
to link our Friday stock performance to the federal indictment.
An initial AP story stated, falsely, that we were somehow
a part of the investigation, implied that the alleged activities
were recent and stated that the indictment was the reason for a
pricing pullback on Friday. We immediately called AP to
protest and issued a statement to the wire service as follows: "We
have never heard of any of the people named in this reported Justice
Department indictment, we have no relationship with any of them,
and we know nothing about these allegations. The first we ever heard
of these charges was when we read about them in The Wall Street
Journal. Our stock trades in an orderly and transparent fashion
and has done so for many years."
The AP issued a
new story that carried my statement and also pointed out that we
"were not accused of any wrongdoing." However, it included
a wild, unsubstantiated headline that said our shares had "fallen
on manipulation scheme." The AP seems to have violated
the most fundamental principle of good journalism – be accurate
and get a source for your story before you publish it. The sensationalist
headline is absolutely false and obviously AP had no source,
or else the story would have cited it.
Our stock was down 45 cents
at the close on Friday from a close of $6.20 the day before. My
own belief is that the pullback in our share price on Friday was
a natural market phenomenon following the rise this past week. At
Friday’s close, our shares were up 5.9% on the week and we
are up 50% since the start of the year. There could be any number
of reasons why our shares have been rising, but I believe that the
market is recognizing that our steadily improving financial performance
makes us a good investment.
Thank you,
Eric Langan
President and CEO
Rick’s Cabaret International, Inc.
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