SEC Charges Company and Two Executives for Misleading COVID-19 Disclosures

The Securities and Exchange Commission today announced charges against Parallax Health Sciences Inc. for making misleading statements about its efforts to fight COVID-19. The SEC also charged Parallax’s Chief Executive Officer Paul Arena and its Chief Technology Officer Nathaniel Bradley for their roles in the statements. Each party has offered to settle the charges. The SEC temporarily suspended trading in Parallax’s common stock on April 10, 2020, due to questions about the accuracy of the company’s statements. According to the SEC’s complaint filed in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York, Parallax issued a series of press releases in March and April 2020 falsely claiming that its purported COVID-19 screening test would be “available soon” and that it had medical and personal protective equipment (PPE) for “immediate sale.” The complaint alleges that Parallax’s insolvency prevented it from developing the screening test, and that the company’s projections showed that even if the company…