Terren Peizer

Terren Scott Peizer (born July 31, 1959) is an American businessperson.

He was the CEO and chairman of Ontrak Inc., a publicly traded healthcare company, but resigned in March 2023 after US authorities charged him with insider trading and securities fraud.

He formerly worked as a junk bond salesman at Drexel Burnham Lambert, and ultimately testified against his former boss Mike Milken in Milken's securities fraud prosecution, in exchange for immunity from both criminal prosecution and SEC sanctions.

He also held executive positions in small-cap technology, debt collection, bicycle tire, shoe importing, and biotech companies.

Peizer's hometown is Beachwood, Ohio.

He attended Beachwood High School.

Peizer graduated with an undergraduate B.S. in Economics from the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania.

He resides in Puerto Rico and Santa Monica, California.

Out of college in 1983, Peizer worked for a few months at Goldman Sachs when he was 21 years old.

Later that year he worked for a stint at First Boston as a high yield bond salesman.

Michael Milken hired Peizer as a junk bond salesman at Drexel Burnham Lambert in 1985.

His job was to manage the Drexel account of the president of high-yield mutual fund manager Solomon Asset Management, with whom Drexel had an illegal arrangement that included insider trading and phony tax losses.

Peizer worked directly under (and at the same desk as) Milken and admired him, sometimes pretending to be him on the phone, and calling him "Dad".

When investigations into Milken's illegal activities began, Peizer starting in 1988 provided material evidence to prosecutors against Milken and Solomon.

In 1989 Peizer purchased the Omaha Racers, a minor league basketball team, but it struggled financially.

He sold the team the following year.

At Milken's pre-sentencing hearing for securities fraud in 1990, Peizer testified against Milken in exchange for immunity from both criminal prosecution and SEC sanctions.

After Drexel, Peizer became a private investor in a series of small companies.

In the mid-1990s Peizer played a role in now-defunct Towers Financial Corporation.

The company was a debt collection agency Ponzi scheme founded by fraudster Steven Hoffenberg, with which Jeffrey Epstein was involved.

Peizer purchased an interest in Advanced Promotion Technologies, which manufactured electronic barcode coupon machines for checkout lines.

In 1991 he gained control of plastics company UTI Chemicals Inc., which had 26 employees, and became its president for a salary of $100,000; the company had a loss of over three million dollars each of the following two years.

In June 1991 Peizer purchased $3.5 million of convertible debentures from Candies, Inc. (formerly known as Millfeld Trading Co.; a shoe importing and marketing business), and became a director of the company.

He had by that time already purchased 135,000 shares of the company's common stock, and when he became a director he received warrants to purchase 1.1 million shares of the company's common stock at $10.00 per share.

Peizer divested himself of over 90% of his stock in the company on September 23, 1991, one day before the company publicly acknowledged that it had materially underpaid its customs obligations and faced a $1.6 million liability.

In early 1992, the price of the company stock collapsed after the company disclosed that it was being investigated by federal prosecutors for systematic underpayment of its customs duties, and Peizer thereafter resigned as a director.

Peizer purchased an interest of over 50% in Urethane Technologies, a small-cap company which manufactured and sold a bicycle tire that it claimed would not go flat, and named himself Chairman.

He sold his shares in 1993 at what was reported to be a $6 million profit, and the company never delivered, lost money, and went bankrupt in 1997.

In 1993 he acquired a 37% share of now-defunct computer parts producer CMS Enhancements.

He was elected chairman of the company, and held the position for two years.

He stepped down as its chairman in 1994.

He subsequently sold his shares, and the company then went bankrupt in 1996.

From 1997 to 1999, Peizer was president of Hollis-Eden, a startup pharmaceutical company.

The New York Times covered the company and his involvement in it in an article entitled: "No Sales, but Watch the Stock Soar".

By 1998 the company still had no sales or earnings.

That year Peizer said: "This is a once in a lifetime opportunity for me. We have something special."

Peizer resigned from the company in March 1999 concurrently with the dismissal of its CEO Richard B. Hollis for cause.

By September 1999 the company's stock was at $13.50, 47% lower than its 52-week high.

In 1999 Peizer raised money for and invested in Tera Computer Company, an unprofitable 112-employee manufacturer of supercomputers.

The money that was raised allowed Tera to later buy the remains of Cray Research, and Peizer was its chairman and a director from 1999 to 2000.