Jonathan Moynahan Larmore

Jonathan Moynahan Larmore is the former owner of Arciterra, a real estate investment company based in Phoenix. On December 21, 2023, the U.S. District Court for the District of Arizona appointed Allen D. Applbaum, a Partner at StoneTurn, as the Receiver of ArciTerra Companies, LLC and its related affiliates (“ArciTerra”), in connection with an alleged $35 million misappropriation of funds by Phoenix-Area Real Estate Fund Adviser Jonathan Larmore and affiliates. In March 2024 Larmore, of Punta Gorda Florida, was charged with one count of tender offer fraud and one count of securities fraud, each of which carries a maximum sentence of 20 years in prison. In October, 2024 he was convicted of one count of tender offer fraud and one count of securities fraud, each of which carries a maximum sentence of 20 years in prison. In the fall of 2023, Larmore perpetrated a scheme to use a false and fraudulent tender offer to manipulate the stock price of WeWork. October 6, 2023, Larmore created Cole Capital Funds LLC (“Cole Capital”), a purported a real estate investment firm that was, in fact, merely a sham company. In November 2023, Larmore spent more than $775,000 buying tens of thousands of cheap, short-dated, out-of-the-money WeWork call options (the vast majority of which were set to expire on November 3, 2023. He then caused a press release to be published announcing that Cole Capital proposed to acquire 51% of all outstanding shares owned by minority shareholders of WeWork at a more-than-700% premium in an all-cash offer worth more than $77 million. At the time, WeWork was on the verge of bankruptcy. Neither Larmore nor Cole Capital had the funds necessary to execute the tender offer and it is alleged the purpose of the press release was to profit on the rise in value of the options Laemore had purchased, Within approximately one minute of publication, in after-hours trading, WeWork’s share price quickly increased more than 70% from $.85 to $1.45, and continued to rise until 5:31 p.m. EDT, when the stock reached its high of $2.14, which was a more-than-150% increase over the stock price prior to the publication of the press release. Unfortunately for LARMORE, he mistimed how long it would take to properly format his press release and have it published. As a result of these delays, LARMORE’s fraudulent press release was not published—and WeWork’s share price did not accordingly rise—until approximately 5:12 p.m. EDT on or about November 3, 2023, which was about an hour after the vast majority of LARMORE’s WeWork call options had expired worthless at 4:00 p.m. EDT that day. On the following Monday, November 6, 2023, WeWork filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection. On or about November 10, 2023, the small number of remaining WeWork options LARMORE had purchased expired out of the money and worthless.