BREAKING NEWS: Autosurf Known As ‘Premium Ads Club’ Tanks; Takes Child’s Chemo Treatments With It, Member Says
An autosurf known as “Premium Ads Club” has tanked. A poster at the ASA Monitor forum said he invested money for his child’s chemotherapy treatment in it.
Premium Ads Club advertised a payout of 135 percent over 15 days. Members said the surf was collecting money as late as this weekend and had just come off a series of 15 percent bonus promotions.
Other surfs in bonus mode now include AdViewGlobal and BizAdSplash, both of which surfaced in the weeks following the government seizure of nearly $100 million from AdSurfDaily Inc. amid allegations of selling unregistered securities and running a Ponzi scheme.
Email To Members
Members say they received this email (below) from the surf, which used SolidTrustPay, the same processor to which ASD was transferring money last summer prior to the seizure. Incredibly, the surf said it collected money from 500 members in the past four days to try to make the Ponzi go away.
The Ponzi did not go away, of course. Premium Ads Club also said it was not blaming anybody, but then proceeded to blame the members for panicking and bringing down operations.
We have not edited this note, except to add italics:
We are truely sad and sorry to send this…
Dear Members,
It is with really heavy hearts that we send this update to you. We are truly sorry and sad to inform you that PAC is officially closed as of now.
The Deposits have been disabled.
There are a few events that have led to this untimely event.
Our Cashflow got seriously affected from when we implemented the PinCode and the recent site accessibility issues.
Sadly members chose to go into Panic mode and stop despositing into PAC. Withdrawals took a huge upswing and in the past 7-9 days and we have had to use up our reserve to supplement payouts to the tune of 10-15K daily. We will need at least another 30K (as of now) to meet today’s payouts.
We have been upfront with you that while we have a business plan, we would still be dependent on member spends to make payouts and would have been at least for 6-9 months minimum.
We also have had 2 of our Private Programs being under investigation so, some of our funds are frozen there.
We hoped by using up our reserve fund, the situation could be turned around. With over 500 new members in the last 4 days, we were almost sure PAC would come through. Unfortunately it hasn’t happened and we are forced to make this decision.
It is not all over. We are still going ahead with the IBC and will continue to do business.
We have a long term investment that will start paying a steady income in some months.
How will this affect you? We are conducting an audit and all members who are not in profit will be refunded. We will do right by you all.
We will begin by refunding AP and LR as soon as the audit is over, because we have those funds.
STP and SP are running on a huge deficit and it will take some time.
We truly understand how disappointing this is and there are just no words for us to express how disappointed we are too.
AggeroInvestment and Scotia Ads are unaffected and will continue to run as normal.
However, we feel that it is best that Roger takes over the day to day operations of AI and he has agreed.
We ask for your understanding and hope that you will trust that we had not forseen that simple technical matters would undo the hard work we all put in together.
We are not blaming anyone.
It is just a sad fact that needs to be pointed out.
We had the very best of intentions and were unable to fulfil them. There are no words to tell you how truly sorry we are.
Sincerely,
Kazzy and EL.
Patrick,
You must have something wrong in your information. We have been assured over and over again that no one EVER gets hurt in autosurf Ponzi’s until the government steps in. The proof is scattered all over the web in posts by ASD supporters, amongst others. For certain, the person who put their child’s chemo treatment funds into Premium Ads Club is lying. It is the members’ fault, or the governments fault. You have to believe what you are reading from Roger, Kazzy and El. After all, they’re God-fearing, upstanding Christian members of the community who have a long track record of business success, never any trouble with the law (well, maybe a speeding ticket), a lawyer who says the SEC has blessed their business model, and a medal of commendation from the president, no less. Sad really……ASD supporters (steelerfan?), see any parallels yet?
Hi Entertained,
Haven’t heard anybody with PAC blame it on the government yet — well, wait.
There was a line in the email that PAC members got that said this:
“We also have had 2 of our Private Programs being under investigation so, some of our funds are frozen there.”
Hmmm. That might be a polite way of blaming it on the government. Perhaps they had money on Antigua? Or perhaps in a couple of the scams CFTC has taken down recently?
They didn’t really say.
What they did say was that they can’t meet the demand for payouts — not even after collecting money from 500 people in recent days, including over the weekend, while telling everybody things were just fine.
Patrick
Ho Hum, it’s beginning to sound like “deja vu, all over again”
The “normal” procedure after the collapse of the “big one” as in 12DP, CEP and now ASD, is the faithful first blame Stormpay/the ebil Gubbmint/BoA/disgruntled spoilsport members, then jump feet first into a range of clones i.e. Alien Trust and Dad ‘n Daves followed 12DP as AVG is feeding off ASD.
As each ponzi collapses naturally, a few of the “true believers” drop off joining the “next big thing”, reducing the lifespan of each succeeding scam, until we are left with new scams lasting literally days before collapse.
Within a few months, the HYIP ponzi “game” scene will be back in the hands of a few “playas” until the next “big one” comes along in around 15 to 18 months.
The Faith R Sloan/Jake Amadee/Gary Jezorski’s and the “usual suspects” will take a few months to enjoy the fruits of their latest efforts before they gird their loins once more to do battle.
And ’round and ’round we go……………………………..
before I write anything on this subject I want to point out I was a kool-aid drinker till December.When I started to write the truth as I saw it on “surf -up” I was ask to leave, so that is why I’m over here. secondly if some of my facts or statement are wrong please correct me.
It’s easy now to see the ponzi side of ASD. but a year ago besides the 12dailypro people not many people did!!! When bought up it was pushed aside with “we are a manual surf” and “we don’t offer a set return.” I met lawyers who joined saying that there are only putting in a grand of adverting because they knew the goverment could close it down and then have a court fight, this is after the lawyers read the TOS.
so who do I blame? well the goverment a little. when they raided the offices of ASD and found the 40 million in uncashed checks, I believe there should have told people ‘we are shutting down this company because we belief it to be a scam and if your check has not been cashed stop payment on it NOW!!!” the goverment did not need to make more victims then ther was.
But I do blame BOA alot. If a ponzi is a ponzi is a ponzi, then BOA should have closed this down in May 0f 08, after the Mineapolis rally bought in $10 mill. It has been reported that the reason the $40 mil was in the office had nothing to do with “the system” being down, but more he had no bank that would touch it!!!
As a person who has had some small businesses, if you start putting funds into you personnal account the tellers will tell you to go see a business banker. Once you get one of those, that business banker tells you he’s going to help you. And if your making money hand over fist He’ll really help you!!! When the money started to pour in to the bank in a little town of Qunincy I’m sure that BOA sent out the best business banker in the area to “Help” Andy, he(the banker) should have smelled a rat. When the first over $10,000.00 cashier check was depoisted that banker should have been all over Andy telling him about the IRS rules in reporting cashier checks over $10,000.00. The 10 or, was it 8 bank accouts, come on!! where was the bank?
One of the very first e-mails I got from a major promotor of ASD bragged about how we did business with BOA, and you know how tough that is!!!”
As for the “usual suspects” if you know them, how come the goverment does go after them? I beleive if you have been in 12dailypro, ASD and now AVG the goverment should make your life very tough. I belive what is needed is Obama with the head of the IRS to tell people to stay away from the auto-surf and that the IRS will call what you purchased an investment and not advdertisng with no money coming in the ponzi will close!!!
Hi Mark,
remember, I over here and not promoting AVG because I know it’s illegal!!! I want it stopped NOW!! and the promoters punished espeically the promoters who have a history of jumping from illegal to illegal surf sites. I joined the co-op advertising (for ASD) and as of march of 08, the propects were telling me that after serching on the net could not find anything bad writtening on ASD. It’s easy being a monday morning quarterback in this enviorment were “pillars of society” are falling left and right in 10 year old ponzi scams. maybe with more of them falling there will be less victims. I don’t know how anyone can promote AVG knowing now what the truth really is. I thank you for what you Patrick
Welcome Mark!
I’m pretty new to this scene as well. I had a friend lose $50K in ASD, and took an interest. Seems like the online Ponzi schemes are JUST like the game Whack-A-Mole that you find in any of the Chucky Cheese parlors.
I will be very curious to seem how the BoA issue evolves. I would guess that the BoA high-flyers historically haven’t sought out the position of branch manager or branch VP for Quincy, Florida. Just a guess, but I’d bet it would not be considered a stepping stone to the BoA executive suite. Quite possible that the local BoA folks dropped the ball, and also possible that they did not (and cannot disclose what they disclosed to the government).
As to the promotors, one can only hope that this time is different wrt prosecution. Some knowledgable folks have suggested this will happen — we will see. Ponzi is a pretty provocative word right now in the public eye, so we’ll see if that ratchets up the prosecution pressure.
Of course they cannot promote it w/o knowing. Everyone at Surf’s Up pushing AVG knows it is a Ponzi. They don’t care, as long as they get their shot at the $$$$ of the victims. AVG is such an obvious Ponzi it is not even funny. Effectively identical to ASD, it will die soon.
I went to Quincy after the convention. it’s only 10 minutes to the city limits of Tallahasee. I’m sure that the BOA in the area was jumping for joy that they had such a great new business to help, and I bet the “big wigs” were on hand when the chamber of commerce had the big lucheon. Remember the world cheered for the macguire/sosa home run chase of 1998.
So, Entertained your guess, will AVG die nautrally with no new money coming in, or with the help of the Feds?
….I am hoping for the government, bringing handcuffs for the promoters. Faster they get there, the fewer people get hurt. OTOH, all the early joiners from ASD probably would get what they deserve….. Call it too close to call.
You know, everyone keeps going on about how XXx should have known, etc… but the fact is a $10,000 deposit isn’t that much for any business larger than the local Burger King. My private company does on average $100,000 a week or so in deposits, and this is something I almost litterally run in the basement. (most of the revenue is actually royalties) And I don’t think anyone at Huntington Bank has run that much of a background check on me.
Of course, if they did, they’d notice I have had an account there for 8 years, it started out at a fraction of what it is now and grew steadily, a lot of it goes back out to suppliers who ship real supplies (how many ad credits are in a case, anyhow) and 90% of my deposits are from the same dealers I’ve had for years…none of whom are comlaining that I don’t send them rebates for more than they paid for hte parts….
I shoulda gone to a better B school, I guess
….maybe, but Bowdoin never had a biz as big as a BK, none of the payments came in from personal checks or credit cards, I’d bet most of the cashier’s checks were nice round numbers, lots of cash deposits, only payments going out to individuals, etc. You and I would have noticed it, but OTOH we don’t aspire to the bank president of the Quincy branch of BoA and I am sure he wasn’t destined for the executive suite either….
Gregg Evans said: “Of course, if they did, they’d notice I have had an account there for 8 years, it started out at a fraction of what it is now and grew steadily, a lot of it goes back out to suppliers who ship real supplies (how many ad credits are in a case, anyhow) and 90% of my deposits are from the same dealers I’ve had for years…none of whom are comlaining that I don’t send them rebates for more than they paid for hte parts….
I shoulda gone to a better B school, I guess”
In light of the e-Gold prosecution, in light of ASD’s prior involvement with e-Gold, in light of the fact Bowdoin purportedly went offshore to get a merchant account, funding it with a $500,000 deposit for CC processing, in light of Bowdoin’s history of securities fraud, in light of Clarence Busby’s history of securities fraud, in light of STP’s involvement, in light of AlertPay’s involvement, in light of previous autosurf prosecutions, in light of the fact Busby chose the same bank amid the same fact set, in light of the sudden and spectacular inflow of huge amounts and lots of suspicious amounts, in light of the fact PayPal won’t do business with these things, the lawyers will be able to point out some red flags.
Please forgive the run-on sentence.
http://www.occ.treas.gov/moneylaundering2002.pdf
Patrick
I have read the uproar over at ASA Monitor. I have never seen such a pathetic bunch of whining and rationalizing in my life. From the guy who bet the kids Chemo money (a story I find very questionable) to the ‘poll’ asking members if they should just put the program on hold and hopefully re-group (actually it gives them an excuse to NOT refund members, which I’m certain they have no intention of doing) to the ones talking about how a ‘more realistic rebate of 1% a day or so’ would make the program more viable..it sickens me. Any discussion in which Faith Sloan is one of the more reasonable voices heard is something to tell you grandkids you saw with your own eyes…
And all of this is brought on for a simple reason, the “admins” are both fairly well known to the core group of victims/co-scammers and they’re in the USA. These two facts make it pretty important that they find a plausible explanation of a legitimate way the program “failed”. Given their audience, its almost possible that they can get away with it, most of the members are some combination of hopelessly gullible and/or codependent on them, but somewhere one of them is going to be losing enough to go to court on this, or you’d think. At least one (or all) of the 500 members who joined in the last 5 days, and therefore are certainly at loss, will explore the civil courts.
How long, oh Lord, how long, will the real enablers, the slimeballs who run the forums and are at the top of the pyramid every time (Ken Russo, Faith Sloan and Jake Amedee are all involved in pimping this one) going to get away with stealing millions of dollars in plain sight?
gregg, it’s not the amount of depoists it’s the cashier checks. when the goverment cracked down on the drug dealers buying cars with cash in the mid-80’s the law was changed to make it so any purchase of anything over $10,000.00 had to be reported to the IRS with the form 8300 ( i think). cashier checks are cash in the eyes of the IRS. When the feds saw the cashier check being turned in at the rallys and no forms being filled out red flags came all over the place.
You’re guessing here that the BoA or “the Feds” didn’t act.
Remember, the lag time between when one of these scams start and are bought to court can (and most often does) run to months, if not years.
I’d assume most people have dealt with banks and government agencies.
Anyone, in virtually any country would know that for information to make it from ground level through BOTH bank and investigative bureaucracies to “the top” in under 6 months would be highly unusual, especially if it didn’t involve “national security” or similar buzzwords.
The original complaint to makes mention that the task force “became aware” in July 2008. One can only assume that complaints had been received long before that date, especially in the “pre Madoff” era.
The 12DP/Stormpay fiasco played out with a similar time span. In that the case, it only came to light many months later that the suspicious payment report provisions of the law had been followed to the letter and that the payment processor/s involved had, in fact, been some of the main sources of both warnings and information.
I have a good source that told me Bowdoin is backing AVG and Busby is backing BizAd
It seems to be an open secret – but what is lacking is the concrete proof, to combat the denials by the promoters of these programmes.
It also begs the question – with what money are they backing it? Offshore funds paid in by members of ASD and Golden Panda that have not been relinquished to the US Government and will not be part of the pot available to claiments?
alescia, they don’t need large offshore amounts to “start one” up, if you have the software you can do it for less than $150, if you need the software, double that and you’re good to go, you’re now a “Major Player” in the autosurf industry
Fair enough – but I wonder what money they are using for the payouts – only AVG members money?
Only new members money, they payout 1% a day, so they can go 99 days without needing anotehr dime, take eveery days cumulative deposits, subbtract money paid out to date, divide that number by 100 and that’s how many days you can pay out…to determine who much to pay out, tkae the total money paid in and not expired, multiply that number by .01, (or whatever the daily rate is) and that’s what you pay on any given day (not the much hyped, revenue in dvided by 2 dvided by active adpacks, see “noobing” to see how that works out)
When the amount you need to pay on any given day exceeds how much you take in on that day, you start composing excuses about DDOS attacks, hackers, embezzlling employees, need for a complete audit of all accounts, bought by overseas investors who shall remain nameless, my dog ate the profits, fire in the office (really used before), or ebil guv’ment investigation.
Oh, and then you offer matching bonuses, have a give away promotion frenzy for a week, and send everyone a note telling htem THEY caused a run on the bank and killed the program, refunds to come later, of course…
Oh wait, there is a SLIGHT chance we can reconfigure the figures and maybe put the program on hold for 6 weeks, at which time we may be able to start back up in come fashion, but going for broke like that MIGHT mean we cannot promise everyone a refund of thier non-profit payments…..
Obvious really, now you put it like that! It’s so simple. Silly me!
No Red Indian Chiefs this time round? I blame it on the trolls.
Wait, wait, you forgot the rallies.
Rallies are without doubt the HYIP ponzi scammers method of choice when it comes to raking in the BIG bucks.
Marsden ran several overseas rallies to great effect with P.I.P.S. and it was only quick action by the SEC which prevented 12DP/Johnson holding her second(third ???) which was due a month after she was busted.
The faithfuls’ reasoning is no “crook” would dare take the risk of putting themselves “out there” in full public view if they weren’t honest.
Well, you’d think. But you have to remember that none of these people is on the short list for the Nobel Prize for Physics.
After a moment of reflection, I figured out why AVG can’t have rallies, and this isn’t a joke: They run serious risk of being arrested on site if they held a rally.
the child chemo post was a farce. of course you clowns would pick it up. we all knew the game. obviously not a site which reports FACTS here. just pick up random posts in random forums.
sheep. and not of the good kind of sheep either.
Interesting post Who!
“We all knew the game”
Nice to see criminals admitting publicly that they knew they were getting into and promoting an illegal Ponzi scheme. Please be aware that in spite of your use of a pseudonym, you can be tracked by the authorities. There are specific laws that enable the normal privacy rules to be circumvented by the law enforcement community in pursuing criminal investigations. OTOH, you’re probably just a small fish scammer, not worthy of the government’s attention. Congratulations on having such a high moral standard that you are happy to steal from others. You should at least be honest about your intentions, go get a gun, and commit armed robbery. That’s a more hosent profession….
Who Cares,
Maybe it is. Maybe it isn’t. It’s plausible, though. Serial promoters position these things as a cure for what ails the economy. It’s not a stretch to believe desperate people would dump precious money into a surf in a bid to make a nightmare go away.
Some of the ASD members said their lives were destroyed when Andy Bowdoin’s money was seized. They told one story of desperation after another, including a story Bowdoin himself related about people not being able to purchase medicine because of the government seizure.
Patrick
[…] PremiumAdsClub (PAC): Tanked in February 2009. Members said it collected money right up to the end. […]