British Columbia Securities Commission

Let’s say you’re an MLMer or network marketer. Your email inbox begins to fill up with offers for a scheme that purports to be an “advertising program” favored by famous brands. Spammers are trying to blast their way into your social-media accounts. The messages: You’re going to be rich in no time. Beyond that, you’re […]

URGENT >> BULLETIN >> MOVING: (15th Update 4:43 p.m. EDT U.S.A.) The SEC has gone to federal court in Massachusetts, charging DFRF Enterprises and alleged operator Daniel Fernandes Rojo Filho with operating a combined pyramid- and Ponzi scheme targeted at “Spanish and Portuguese-speaking communities in Massachusetts, Florida, and elsewhere in the U.S.” Six alleged promoters […]

URGENT >> BULLETIN >> MOVING: (Updated 6:30 p.m. EDT U.S.A.) The British Columbia Securities Commission has issued an Investor Alert on “DFRF Enterprises LLC, DFRF Enterprises Ltd., or other companies associated with Daniel Fernandez Rojo Filho.” This appears to be the first such warning about DFRF in North America. The claims associated with Rojo Filho […]

The British Columbia Securities Commission, which regulates securities in the Canadian province, has banned a U.S. resident who allegedly promoted a series of schemes on commission. “Sharon Downing has admitted that she engaged in an illegal distribution of securities,” BCSC said. Downing, according to BCSC, promoted schemes for Thomas Arthur Williams and six entities engaged […]

Two Canadians have been charged by the SEC in an alleged pump-and-dump scheme that included a reverse merger between a “shell public company” and a startup, “blast emails” and a concerted hype campaign, the U.S. agency said. Named defendants are Bruce D. Strebinger, 38, of Vancouver, and Brent Howard Chapman, 38, who “is or has […]

EDITOR’S NOTE: eAdGear, which had entities in California and Hong Kong, “primarily” targeted “investors in the U.S., China, and Taiwan” and gathered $129 million in a combined pyramid- and Ponzi scheme that engaged in brand-leeching, the SEC alleged last week. An MLM scam known as WCM777, which allegedly gathered more than $80 million, also engaged […]

A British Columbia man already under investigation for duping investors $5,000 at a time doubled down and then went for $10,000, the British Columbia Securities Commission said. Won Sang Chen Cho, also known as Craig Cho, now has been banned for life from the securities trade, the agency said. Cho, the agency said, “poses a […]

EDITOR’S NOTE: The PP Blog reported yesterday about a massive alleged penny-stock scam married to an advance-free fraud scheme in which investors were duped into believing they were interacting with IRS employees trying to collect taxes and a law firm interested in recovering funds from the stock swindle. Federal prosecutors in Brooklyn said the scammers […]

EDITOR’S NOTE: Thanks to PP Blog reader “Tony” for pointing us to the British Columbia Securities Commission (BCSC) warning against the Lucra Fund and Goldenarium HYIP schemes. Earlier this month, BCSC issued a warning on the Profitable Sunrise scheme. The British Columbia Securities Commission has issued warnings on HYIP “programs” known as Lucra Fund and […]

BULLETIN: A potential new form of online fraud that sells memberships for up to $5,000, purportedly pays participants for clicking on ads and also invites them to exchange “private” shares in the venture through a purported “internal trading platform” has been discovered in Canada, according to the British Columbia Securities Commission (BCSC). The scheme recorded […]

EDITOR’S NOTE: Some investors in Canada, the United States, the United Kingdom and potentially elsewhere got an unpleasant Valentine’s Day surprise when they learned that an investment scheme into which they had plowed millions of dollars was under investigation by the British Columbia Securities Commission (BCSC) in Canada. In the early stages of the probe, […]