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Financier Jeffrey Epstein’s Gratitude America Ltd. foundation was granted stock allocations in 40 underwritten offerings, according to the foundation’s 2017 tax return. Morgan Stanley led all those offerings, and was the sole underwriter on 12 of them.

Those allocations included the hot IPO of streaming TV provider Roku and secondary offerings from such companies as Tribune Media, Britain’s OM Asset Management, and GoDaddy. In most cases, the foundation sold the shares at a quick profit, according to the tax return.

Epstein, who pleaded guilty in 2008 to soliciting child prostitutes, claimed assets of more than half a billion dollars—including $113 million in equities—in a recent unsuccessful bid to get out on bail after his July 8 arrest on federal charges of underage sex trafficking. Epstein has pleaded not guilty to the charges.

Deutsche Bank dropped Epstein this year as a client of its private-wealth division, according to The Wall Street Journal. He had brought his money there in 2013, after years with JPMorgan Chase’s private bank.

The bank decided to end the relationship after the Miami Herald ran a series of articles last year about the plea deal granted Epstein in 2008 by Miami’s then-U.S. attorney, Alexander Acosta, according to the Journal. After Epstein’s recent arrest, Acosta resigned as U.S. Labor secretary.

Among the deals in which Morgan Stanley was the sole underwriter, and in which Epstein’s foundation got a cut, were US Foods Holding and Norwegian Cruise Line Holdings. The foundation also got shares in the Morgan Stanley–led October 2016 deal for ZTO Express, the Chinese delivery company. Other banks may have provided shares to the foundation in the deals in which Morgan Stanley was not the sole underwriter.

Morgan Stanley declined to comment. The lawyers who represent Epstein as he fights the federal child-sex-trafficking charges did not respond to Barron’s queries.

Stock-offering allocations, which investment bankers give out to their important customers, are some of Wall Street’s most sought-after prizes. The recipients can often count on a quick gain, since bankers traditionally underprice deals to make stocks pop in early trading.

By itself, Epstein’s charitable foundation would seem an unlikely recipient of the allocations, because of its small size. The foundation began 2017 with $9 million in assets, with which it made about $10 million worth of buys and sells during that year.

“Deutsche Bank is closely examining any business relationship with Jeffrey Epstein, and we are absolutely committed to cooperating with all relevant authorities,” said a spokesman in response to a query from Barron’s. The bank was an underwriter in one of the 40 deals in which the Epstein foundation got an allocation.

JPMorgan declined to discuss with Barron’s reports that it had severed ties with Epstein in 2013.

Gratitude America’s 2017 tax return is one of the few public records of Epstein’s stock trading. It shows gains and losses on some 50 trades completed that year. The portfolio’s gains on those trades lagged behind the market. But the price and timing of the positions show that nearly all of them were allocations of underwritten stock offerings that the foundation quickly sold.

Write to Bill Alpert at william.alpert@barrons.com