Q. I discovered that nine securities — valued at about $120,000 — had been transferred
out of my wife’s Roth I.R.A. at Vanguard about four days earlier without our authorization.
These transfers were made to an account managed by Merrill.
The firms investigated, and our securities were returned.
But we still don’t entirely understand how this happened, and whether Merrill took the proper precautions.
— Tien Tran, California
“A criminal impostor opened two accounts in Mr. Tran’s wife’s name at Merrill
and requested the transfer from Vanguard, but the fraudster hadn’t yet run off with the money.
Merrill, part of Bank of America, froze the funds.”“Mr. Tran’s wife received her money back in a little more than a week or so, but Mr. Tran said
they had never received a satisfying explanation.
He is well aware of how easy it is for criminals to obtain sensitive personal data like names,
addresses and Social Security numbers.
But he was hoping for a full postmortem so they could better understand what may have left them vulnerable.”“What if they had been traveling and hadn’t stumbled upon the crime scene?
Was it really that easy to open a new account with stolen information and simply request a transfer?”Although not a panacea, Fidelity offers a
Money Transfer Lock feature that could help prevent
unauthorized transfers/withdrawals.
I recently initiated a Fidelity transfer — executed via ACATS
¹ — which was blocked because I forgot
to disable
Money Transfer Lock beforehand.
Article linked below
² may be paywalled.
¹ https://www.finra.org/rules-guidance/key-topics/customer-account-transfers² https://www.nytimes.com/2025/10/03/your-money/ira-vanguard-merrill-acats-fraud.html
Comments
I was prompted to create a free account or log in.
I don't currently have a NYT subscription.
However, I was able to read this story by searching for the exact title — Her Stocks
Were Quietly Stolen From Her I.R.A. — and then clicking the corresponding NYT article.
It appears they'll give readers one "freebie?"
This seems to be a somewhat common practice on various websites.
https://dnyuz.com/2025/10/03/her-stocks-were-quietly-stolen-from-her-i-r-a/
Several months ago, we froze asset transfer in our Fidelity accounts including ACATS transfer. You can unfreeze it temporary to make withdrawal and freeze it immediately. Very convenient to do on Fidelity site.
Google search was negative for Schwab but it mentioned the option available for Fidelity customers.
After reading the article again the illegal ACATS transfer was taken place at Vanguard. Time must have change. My prior experience was that asset transfer requires both electronic submission AND paper form filing that takes over a minimum of one week to complete. In the meantime there would be email notification throughout the transferring process. Slow but very thorough. Lesson learned here is to monitor your account at least once a month, and pay attention to emails from your brokerage, and track the accounts on a spreadsheet for any irregularity.
Independent vanguard adviser reported this yesterday, but even Jeff could not get a response from Vanguard.
https://www.independentvanguardadviser.com/weekly-brief-lock-it-down/
The Fidelity lock works. I had it on and even my advisor was unable to move money. This firm I am using has insisted on "Level two" which prevents anyone but them from trading. Moving money requires a paper form. I am sure someone could hack them but then they are sorta responsible, similar to a brokerage account at Morgan Stanley for example.
I have done multiple transfers in Schwab, and the process is complicated but once you set up the account transfer it is easy. Maybe too easy.
As I remember it is two steps. You complete the form on line and then two small deposits show up in the target account which have to be confirmed.
These might not be noticed by most customers, unless you download your transactions regularly.
Probably the most important step is to set up alerts to your email and phone of changes in your profile ( ie email etc) and Deposits and Transfers.
I will check if there are some asset level alerts at Schwab and Vanguard.
Do change password after any fraud alert(s).
Edit/Add. FWIW, Vanguard does have "Initiated, in progress, and completed status messages for asset transfers" alert.