By Chris Prentice and Manya Saini
HOUSTON, Aug 18 (Reuters) – The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission on Tuesday sued the former CEO and two other top executives of Tricolor, the latest fallout after the collapse of the Texas-based used-car seller and subprime lender last year.
The SEC charged former CEO Daniel Chu, Chief Financial Officer Jerome Kollar and Senior Finance Director Ameryn Seibold for their roles in an alleged multi-year scheme to defraud investors in Tricolor. The firm filed for bankruptcy in September 2025.
“We allege that these defendants defrauded investors based on bogus collateral and violated the integrity of our private credit markets,” David Woodcock, SEC enforcement director, said in a statement about the charges.
The SEC’s complaint, which alleged Tricolor’s top executives defrauded investors by double-pledging hundreds of millions of dollars of subprime auto loans, came after U.S. prosecutors filed parallel criminal charges in December.
According to the SEC, from at least 2020 until Tricolor’s bankruptcy in September 2025, the three executives made false and misleading statements to investors about the firm’s financial health as it raised more than $1.9 billion through asset-backed securities offerings.
Matthew Schwartz, a lawyer for Chu with Boies Schiller Flexner, said in a statement that the SEC’s case is a “rehash” of prior allegations, many of which are inaccurate.
“We look forward to a full and fair hearing in the courtroom,” Schwartz said.
A lawyer for Seibold declined to comment, while an attorney for Kollar did not respond immediately to a request for comment.
The SEC’s complaint charges Chu, Kollar and Seibold with violating the antifraud provisions of U.S. securities laws. The agency is seeking disgorgement of ill-gotten gains and penalties, as well as barring Chu and Kollar from serving as officers or directors of public companies.
Chu separately has pleaded not guilty to all charges in an eight-count criminal indictment.
Earlier this month, a federal judge rejected his request to dismiss the top charge in the criminal indictment accusing him of systematic fraud that led to Tricolor’s collapse.
(Reporting by Chris Prentice in Houston and Manya Saini in Bengaluru; Editing by Diti Pujara and Jamie Freed)
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