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Tag: FINRA

ALERT! On Heels Of SEC’s Complaint Against Alleged Latvian Hacker Accused Of Manipulating Stock Prices By Hijacking Brokerage Accounts, FINRA Warns Of Plots Targeting Email Accounts

“Investors who suspect that their email account has been hacked should immediately notify their brokerage firm and other financial institutions, and anyone who suspects they have been defrauded should file a complaint with FINRA.” — Gerri Walsh, vice president for Investor Education, Financial Industry Regulatory Authority, Jan. 26, 2012 The Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA)…

Jan 27, 2012
‘DAVE’ UPDATE: JSS Tripler 2 (T2) Blocks Public Access To Forum; Purported ‘Admin’ Claims Members Distorting ‘The Facts’ As He Announces ‘Scan’ Of Member-Critics On MoneyMakerGroup; Faith Sloan Chides Legendary Huckster ‘Ken Russo’ With ‘Oopsies’

UPDATE: “Dave,” the purported “admin” of an increasingly bizarre HYIP known as JSS Tripler 2 (T2), has blocked public access to the T2 forum. T2, which purportedly was born after a meeting of Ponzi-forum minds, is using payment processors notoriously friendly to Ponzi and fraud schemes. The “program” is trading on the name of a…

Jan 12, 2012
SEC Names 3 Defendants In Alleged $16 Million Credit-Card ‘Merchant Portfolio’ Ponzi Scheme Targeted At Mormons; Records Show Schemes Within Schemes Dating Back Years

EDITOR’S NOTE: If you’re keeping a Bubba Blue notebook on how to have a Ponzi scheme as opposed to shrimp, here is an entry: an alleged “merchant portfolio” Ponzi scheme. Ponzi and fraud schemes often use impressive-sounding terminology to separate people from their money. Schemes typically mushroom to consume millions of dollars when investors —…

Jan 5, 2012
MoneyMakerGroup Ponzi Forum ‘Temporarily’ Closes ‘JustBeenPaid’ Thread After Bickering Between Former Club Asteria Pitchman And Pitchman For ‘New’ Program Trading On JustBeenPaid’s Name

We’ve mentioned it before — and we’ll mention it again. In July 2010, the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA) described the HYIP sphere as a “bizarre substratum of the Internet.” It was as good a description as any, and here is yet another case in point: The MoneyMakerGroup Ponzi forum said today that it “temporarily”…

Oct 31, 2011
UPDATE: Club Asteria, Cherry Shares, ‘JustBeenPaid’ Promoter ’10BucksUp’ Falsely Claims PP Blog Posts As ‘ISPY’ On MoneyMakerGroup Ponzi Forum; HYIP Apologist Taunts U.S. Law Enforcement In Bizarre Post

The bizarre descent into chaos of a failing “program” that claimed to be moving to “offshore” servers and once made its participants swear they were not government spies or media lackeys has gotten stranger yet. Poster “10BucksUp,” who’s now flogging the JustBeenPaid “program,” falsely claimed on the MoneyMakerGroup Ponzi forum today that the PP Blog…

Sep 13, 2011
UPDATE: Club Asteria Pitchman And TalkGold Promoter ’10BucksUp’ Declares That Filing An AlertPay Dispute To Recover Money From Yet-Another Tanking HYIP Scheme ‘Drastic’ Measure That Will Cause ‘All’ Members To ‘Suffer’

You can’t make this stuff up . . . A Club Asteria pitchman flogging multiple HYIP schemes on the TalkGold Ponzi forum says that late-entry members of a teetering “program” known as “JustBeenPaid” are engaging in hurtful and “drastic measures” if they file disputes with AlertPay. Filing a dispute means that “all members will suffer,”…

Sep 6, 2011
UPDATE: CONSOB, Italy’s Securities Regulator, Issues New Order In Probe Related To Club Asteria; Findings And Effect Not Immediately Clear; Google Translation Software Calls CONSOB A ‘Bag’; Yahoo Calls Club A ‘Starfish’; PP Blog Awaits Official Government Translation

Dear Readers, The PP Blog became aware last night that CONSOB, Italy’s equivalent of the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), had issued a new order on Monday in its investigation into certain claims made online in Italy about the purported Club Asteria business “opportunity.” Club Asteria has been widely promoted online as a “passive”…

Aug 24, 2011
BULLETIN: ASDCashGenerator Website Now Returns A Server Error; PP Blog Observed Error After Clicking On Link In 2008 ASD Promo That Featured Photo Of Current Club Asteria Pitchman Hank Needham

BULLETIN: (UPDATED 10:16 A.M. EDT (AUG. 22, U.S.A.) As the PP Blog first reported on July 12, the ASDCashGenerator.com domain once controlled by accused Ponzi schemer Andy Bowdoin had returned online and was promoting a mysterious opportunity known as “Ad Sales Daily International.” But the ASDCashGenerator website now is throwing a server error and returning…

Aug 21, 2011
BULLETIN: Vincent McCrudden Pleads Guilty To Threatening Regulators, Government Officials

BULLETIN: Vincent McCrudden, who was arrested in January amid allegations he threatened to kill 47 regulators and government officials, has pleaded guilty to two counts of transmitting threats to kill. McCrudden, 50, faces up to 10 years in prison. He has been jailed since his arrest in New Jersey. “Mr. McCrudden made bone-chilling and graphic…

Jul 18, 2011
UPDATE: PowerPoint Presentation For Club Asteria Says ‘Passive’ Income ‘100% GUARANTEED’: Is ‘Ken Russo’ Tone Deaf? Promoter Brags About $321 Payment Sent By Wire While Another Laments Payment Of 30 Cents; Members Say They’ll Contact AlertPay

UPDATED 9:09 A.M. EDT (June 14, U.S.A.) A PowerPoint pitch titled “Asteria Corporation” raises serious questions about the nature of the business “opportunity” and may undermine Club Asteria’s own claims that members alone are to blame for the company’s apparent troubles. The document is slugged “[ClubAsteriaPresentation]” and attributed to Asteria Corp. and Andrea Lucas. It…

Jun 13, 2011
ILLINOIS MAN INDICTED: Edward L. Moskop Accused In Alleged Multmillion-Dollar Ripoff Of Elderly Couple, Friends, Relatives — And The Local VFW Post

In a criminal case that flowed from an SEC civil action, an Illinois man has been indicted on mail-fraud and money-laundering charges in a case that alleges he stole from elderly clients and the local Veterans of Foreign Wars Post. Edward L. Moskop, 63, of Belleville, originally was charged in November 2010 by the SEC,…

May 27, 2011