The Financial Markets Authority of New Zealand (FMA) has joined regulators in the United States, Canada and the United Kingdom in issuing a warning on the Profitable Sunrise HYIP “program.” New Zealand’s warning also extends to NJF Global Group, which appears to be a Profitable Sunrise recruitment organization operating from the United States. (More below.)
FMA’s announcement described Profitable Sunrise as “illegal,” saying the “program” also is known as ProSun and is being advertised on YouTube by an individual named Robert “Bob” Hughes. The “NJF” initials appear to stand for Profitable Sunrise promoter Nanci Jo Frazer of Ohio. The NJF Global Group now appears to be calling itself “The Global Impact Resource Alliance Group.”
North Carolina regulators said late last month that Profitable Sunrise listed a business address in the United Kingdom and was asking that money be sent by wire to the Czech Republic. Warnings subsequently were issued by the state of Alabama, the Financial Services Authority of the United Kingdom and the Canadian provinces of Alberta, Ontario, British Columbia and Quebec.
At least some of the Profitable Sunrise videos attributed to Hughes appear to have been removed from YouTube or to have been blocked from public access. Google cache (from Feb. 10, 2013) shows that the videos also touted NJF Global Group and positioned Profitable Sunrise as a better option than “Banners Broker.” One of the videos was titled “Income From Profitable Sunrise Blows Away What You Can Make With Banners Broker.” Another was titled “Forget Banners Broker & Make Real Money With Profitable Sunrise & NJF Global Group.”
Like Profitable Sunrise, Banners Broker also is being promoted on well-known Ponzi scheme forums such as TalkGold and MoneyMakerGroup.
There were reports today that Banners Broker has been stripped of its ability to distribute money via MasterCard debit cards. Other Ponzi-board “programs,” including Imperia Invest IBC in 2010, have met similar fates. Imperia was met with a cease-and-desist order from Visa. An action by the SEC to halt Imperia’s operations followed.
Other Profitable Sunrise videos attributed to Hughes made headline appeals to populations in entire countries and had titles such as:
“Our NJF Global Team In Profitable Sunrise Invites Those In New Zealand To Join Us”
“Our Private NJF Global Team In Profitable Sunrise Is Inviting Those In Korea To Join Us”
“Our NJF Global Group In Profitable Sunrise Invites Those From India To Join Our Top Team”
“NJF Global Group / Profitable Sunrise Invites Those In The Philippines To Join Our Private Team”
“NJF Global Group / Profitable Sunrise Invites Those In Thailand To Join Our Amazing Team”
“Our Profitable Sunrise / NJF Global Group Invites Those From Germany To Join Our Team”
“Our NJF Global Group In Profitable Sunrise Invites Those In China To Join Our Amazing Team”
“Our NJF Global Group In Profitable Sunrise Invites Those In Australia To Join Our Team”
“Profitable Sunrise – The 2.7% Daily Long Haul Plan Is Closing Soon”
“Profitable Sunrise – How To Move Money From The Private Plan To The Long Haul Plan”
“Profitable Sunrise & Our NJF Global Group Really Are Helping People To Retire Early”
“The Best Way To Join Profitable Sunrise Is Through Our Private Group – NJF Global Group”
Here is the New Zealand warning, as published March 11 (italics added):
Warning: Beware of offerings of securities made by NJF Global Group and Profitable Sunrise
11 March 2013
The Financial Markets Authority (FMA) warns the public of an illegal offering of securities by Profitable Sunrise (Prosun) and/or NGF Global Group which has been advertised on ‘youtube’ by Mr Robert(Bob)Hughes, also known as Bob Hughes.
It is FMA’s understanding that these entities are operating from the UK and the US.
FMA is concerned that Prosun is illegally offering securities to the public in New Zealand in breach of NZ securities law, and warns New Zealanders not to invest in the above entities.
If you have invested with Profitable Sunrise or NJF Global Group, FMA would like to hear from you. Please contact our helpline on 0800 434 567.
EDITOR’S NOTE: The PP Blog sought comment from Troy Dooly of MLMHelpDesk this morning (Sunday) on the disturbing Zeek- and Ponzi forum-related developments reported in our story below. (Story appears below screen shots.) Dooly has not responded as of the time of this post, but the PP Blog will publish his comment if and when received. (UPDATE 10:24 p.m. Dooly has responded to the request for comment. His comment has been added to the story below.)
Various efforts to mislead Zeek members and the public about the SEC’s Aug. 17 action against Zeek Rewards amid allegations that Zeek was a $600 million Ponzi- and pyramid fraud now are under way online. If you’ve received an email attributed to Zeek member Dave Kettner that claims “[t]he SEC acknowledged that there are a couple of problems with the case against Zeek Rewards and Rex Venture group,” it almost certainly is best to be extremely skeptical of the claims. Similar claims were made by apologists for the AdSurfDaily Ponzi scheme.
These are among the claims attributed to Zeek-member Kettner, who is using the pronoun “we” when referring to the SEC:
We (the SEC) are not able to find a victim in this case. We are not able to find anybody at this time that has been harmed by Zeek Rewards.
We (the SEC) are having a hard time finding a security. In the complaint, it said that Zeek was selling securities and was an investment scheme.
Beginning in August 2009, dozens of AdSurfDaily members flooded the docket of U.S. District Judge Rosemary Collyer with claims the government had produced no “VICTIMS” in the ASD Ponzi case. The pleadings appear to have been based on a template shared by one or more ASD downline groups. Included among the filers was Todd Disner, then an emerging figure in the ASD story and now an emerging figure in the Zeek story.
Collyer rejected each and every one of the claims. In September 2011, the U.S. government announced it had identified at least 8,400 ASD victims. Two months later — in November 2011 — Disner filed a lawsuit against the government that alleged it had produced a “tissue of lies” and that ASD was a legitimate enterprise. About seven months later — in May 2012 — ASD operator Andy Bowdoin pleaded guilty to wire fraud and admitted ASD was a Ponzi scheme and that the company never had operated lawfully. The government now says it has identified at least 9,000 ASD victims.
Justia.com has archived Collyer’s ASD docket and the related filings here. Disner’s unsuccessful filing is Docket No. 91. The ruling rejecting his claim (and others) is Docket No. 96. Despite the denials, other ASD members continued to use the same no “VICTIMS” argument, which incorporated a conspiracy theory that government evil was afoot. Collyer eventually issued en masse denials.
Disner, Kettner and Zeek figure Robert Craddock are known to be involved in an effort to raise funds purportedly to defend Zeek affiliates while taking the SEC to task. The effort has been marked by shifting stories, contributing to an atmosphere of confusion. PP Blog guest columnist Gregg Evans wrote about some of that confusion here. The SNR Denton law firm, once presented by Craddock as the attorneys for Zeek affiliates, now appears to have withdrawn its representation. Meanwhile, a website known as ZTeamBiz that was gathering funds for the purported Zeek defense has been blocked by PayPal, a development ZTeamBiz blamed on purported fear of competition by eBay. eBay owns PayPal.
RealScam.com (GlimDropper) now is reporting that ZTeamBiz is soliciting money via “electronic check drafts” and potentially putting contributors’ banking information at risk.
Meanwhile, it’s worth pointing out that the U.S. Secret Service confirmed on Aug. 17 that it was investigating Zeek. Beyond that, the office of North Carolina Attorney General Roy Cooper has confirmed it is investigating Zeek. At least two proposed class-action lawsuits also have been filed against Zeek. The SEC is hardly Zeek’s only worry.
Here, now, our story about how a Ponzi-board poster appears to be causing Dooly’s MLMHelpDesk.com to load beneath a different URL in an apparent bid to create confusion about the SEC’s Zeek action while also leeching off Dooly’s work product to gather “leads.”
1.
"freezeekler," a MoneyMakerGroup Ponzi forum poster in the "ProfitClicking" thread, is using his (or her) forum signature to help disinformation about Zeek spread online. ProfitClicking may have ties to the "sovereign citizens" movement.
2.
The redirect from the signature of "freezeekler" at the MoneyMakerGroup Ponzi forum causes Troy Dooly's MLMHelpDesk.com Blog to load under a URL styled "draftsforcash.com."
3.
On the MoneyMakerGroup Ponzi forum, "freezeekler" says his (or her) plan with the "ProfitClicking" program is to "withdraw at least until I have my investment back."
UPDATED 10:24 P.M. EDT (U.S.A.) TO ADD FIRST COMMENT FROM TROY DOOLY. UPDATED AT 11:25 P.M. TO REFLECT COMMENT FROM DOOLY THAT THE OFFENDING PAGE DESCRIBED BELOW HAS BEEN REMOVED. UPDATED 9:13 A.M. (SEPT. 10) TO FIX REDUNDANCY IN THIRD PARAGRAPH.
Efforts to spread disinformation about the SEC’s action in the Zeek Rewards Ponzi case intensified on the web yesterday. One such bid occurred within the thread on the “ProfitClicking” scam-in-progress at the MoneyMakerGroup Ponzi forum, where a poster known as “freezeekler” is using the following “signature” line (italics added):
Hot! ZEEK REWARDS Coming Back, NOT GUILTY? NEW updated information!
“freezeekler” apparently also is in “ProfitClicking,” given his (or her) MoneyMakerGroup comment about a plan to “withdraw at least until I have my [ProfitClicking] investment back.”
MoneyMakerGroup is listed in U.S. federal court filings as a place from which Ponzi schemes are promoted. Records show that five major scams promoted on the forum in recent years — Zeek, AdSurfDaily, Legisi, Pathway To Prosperity and Imperia Invest IBC — allegedly gathered a combined sum of at least $868 million. By contrast, the 2013 budget for the city of Las Vegas is $468.8 million, according to a May report in the Las Vegas Sun. The population of Las Vegas is approximately 590,000.
In terms of the number of victims — currently estimated at between 1 million and 2 million — Zeek may be the largest Ponzi scheme ever investigated by U.S. law enforcement. Its membership base may be at least 10 times larger than ASD, whose base was estimated by the U.S. Department of Justice at 97,000. Zeek’s estimated cash-drawing power of $600 million appears to have been approximately five times larger than ASD’s.
When “freezeekler’s” signature link is clicked, a redirect kicks in and visitors are taken to a URL styled “draftsforcash.com” and a page styled “zeekrewards.” (draftsforcash.com/zeekrewards.) When visitors move their mouse, a lead-capture ad then loads for a 60-minute “webinar” for an unspecified program that asks viewers to submit their name, email address and phone number.
Although visitors may believe they are at the “draftsforcash” site’s Zeek Rewards page, they’re actually at the site of Troy Dooly’s MLMHelpDesk. MoneyMakerGroup’s “freezeekler” appears to have caused the redirect to Dooly’s Blog to occur without causing the URL for MLMHelpDesk to appear in the location bar. Visitors unfamiliar with Dooly could come to believe he is the owner of “draftsforcash.”
That domain, however, is registered on the name of Bargain Crusader Inc., according to a whois search. When the “zeekrewards” page is stripped from the “draftsforcash.com/zeekrewards” URL, visitors see Blog whose sole story appears under a headline of “Daily, and Weekly fantasy sports leagues.”
The “skin” for the one-post Blog, according to a link at the site, is provided by “online casino uk site in cooperation with play roulette for fun weblog.”
Dooly tonight expressed concern about the Ponzi-forum development.
“This is nuts,” he said in an an initial email to the PP Blog. “Thank you for sharing this info with me. I will do a post tomorrow on this issue.”
In a second email to the Blog, Dooly said his company took quick action to ensure the offending page was taken down.
“My COO jumped on the issue as soon as I sent it to him,” Dooly said.
ProfitClicking is an ASD-like autosurf formed from the carcass of the JSS Tripler/JustBeenPaid “program” that suddenly went missing last month amid reports of the sudden “retirement” of Frederick Mann, the purported operator of JSS/JBP.
Mann is a former pitchman for the ASD Ponzi scheme. JSS/JBP claimed to have more than 1 million members. Its cash-sucking power remains unclear.
BULLETIN: The CFTC has gone to federal court in the Southern District of New York, alleging that Marc Perlman of Rancho Cucamonga, Calif., and his firm, iGlobal Strategic Management LLC, were running a commodity-pool and Forex Ponzi scheme targeted at deaf Christians.
Perlman and the company have been charged with fraud. The CFTC said the scheme sucked in “at least $670,000 from at least 17 people.”
In at least one instance, the CFTC charged, Perlman encouraged an investor “to sell a house at a price that would result in a quick sale, stating that the profits that the iGlobal Investor would earn with iGlobal would make up for the lost equity.”
It is at least the third major fraud scheme targeted at the deaf community since 2009. In October 2010, the SEC charged an entity known as Imperia Invest IBC in a caper that sucked in millions of dollars and affected thousands of people with hearing impairments. In 2009, the FTC charged Affiliate Strategies Inc. (ASI) in a government-grants scam. The Noobing autosurf was in the ASI stable of companies, and promotions were targeted at the deaf.
Both Imperia Invest and Noobing were promoted on the MoneyMakerGroup and TalkGold Ponzi forums — the same venues from which Ponzi schemes such as AdSurfDaily and alleged Ponzi schemes such as Zeek Rewards were promoted.
“Perlman furthered his and iGlobal’s fraudulent scheme by playing upon the Christian faith of certain iGlobal investors, using claims about his own faith and references to scripture to obtain the trust of certain iGlobal investors,” the CFTC charged.
Victims hailed from Arizona, California, Florida, Georgia, Michigan, Oregon, Utah, Washington and Pennsylvania, the CFTC said, noting that Perlman is deaf.
“Perlman offered to have calls with certain potential iGlobal Investors through a video phone system that enables communication through sign language,” the CFTC charged. “During these calls, Perlman told certain potential iGlobal Investors that he was offering them the opportunity to invest in a forex investment system that would yield profits of 10 percent each month. He later revised this projected number to 5 percent after certain iGlobal Investors invested funds.”
The U.K. Financial Services Authority assisted in the CFTC probe, CFTC said.
Although accused Ponzi schemer and AdSurfDaily President Andy Bowdoin appears not to be among the promoters of JSS Tripler (T2), T2 appears to be relying on a Bowdoin-like playbook in announcing a restart after having earlier suspended payouts.
The bizarre international spectacle created by JSS Tripler 2 (T2) is continuing — and gets stranger and more insidious by the day. The purported “opportunity,” which is trading on the name of a murky entity known as JSS Tripler and apparently cloning its Ponzi business model, has announced a restart after weeks of existing in a state of suspended animation purportedly caused by the freezing of a one-time T2 business partner’s AlertPay account.
T2 now claims it has regained access to the frozen AlertPay funds.
A week or so prior to T2’s purported restart, promoters of JSS Tripler, the purported “opportunity” upon which T2 based its name, became the subject of a securities investigation in Europe. Ponzi-forum hucksters — some of whom are promoting both T2 and JSS Tripler — scoffed at the CONSOB probe and flooded the MoneyMakerGroup Ponzi forum with “I got paid” posts.
It is axiomatic that all successful Ponzi schemes pay. That an “opportunity” pays is not evidence that no underlying criminality exists. The timing of T2’s restart — indeed, the restart occurred after the Italian regulator CONSOB announced that JSS Tripler promoters were being scrutinized — demonstrates that the serial hucksters driving T2 are turning a blind eye to the serious issues being raised in Europe.
The development is hardly unprecedented, given that core groups of scammers who populate the Ponzi boards and simultaneously maintain their own fraud sites thumbed their noses after law-enforcement moved against “opportunities” such as Pathway To Prosperity, Legisi, Gold Quest International, Imperia Invest IBC and others, including AdSurfDaily.
Like its namesake JSS Tripler, T2 advertises a return rate of 2 percent a day, twice that of ASD. In 2008, the U.S. Secret Service called ASD an international Ponzi scheme. Tens of millions of dollars were seized from bank accounts, and ASD operator Andy Bowdoin later was arrested on charges of wire fraud, securities fraud and selling unregistered securities.
At least $110 million found its way into ASD or related coffers, prosecutors said. Several million dollars were moved into Canada just prior to the seizure of ASD-related assets in August 2008, according to court filings.
In early 2007, according to prosecutors, ASD suffered a Ponzi collapse that in part was blamed on “Russian” hackers. Bowdoin claimed the hackers stole $1 million, but he never filed a police report.
Like T2 did between at least December 2011 and February of this year, ASD existed in a state of suspended animation for months in 2007. Bowdoin eventually restarted the “opportunity” under a different name and different website — ASDCashGenerator, as opposed to AdSurfDaily — and began the process of picking pockets anew, federal prosecutors said.
Unlike ASD, T2 did not claim its payout problems were caused by Russian hackers. Instead, the “opportunity” claimed a onetime business partner known as “Chris,” purportedly living in England, was to blame.
Like ASD, however, T2 claimed it was changing names, morphing from JSS Tripler 2 to T2MoneyKlub. The name change was explained to be part of an overall restart plan in which T2 would create revenue streams by building prefabricated websites and offering them for sale at a tremendous profit. The plan, which appeared to be exceptionally forward-looking while making preposterous assumptions, presented fallacies of logic such as these:
That T2, operating with an in-house skeleton crew and volunteer members, no declared base of operations and no compliance arm despite reaching into dozens of countries each with a unique set of laws, could at once be a web-service provider while managing a “program” that promised a return rate of 2 percent a day or 730 percent a year on top of recruitment-commission payments.
That web-service customers would pay a premium for sites built by a murky entity whose operators simultaneously were offering investors returns that would make Bernard Madoff blush.
That the fees generated by the sale of websites at a future point uncertain somehow could sustain a scheme that promised to pay out twice as much as ASD, whose operator already was under indictment on Ponzi-related charges and had advertised the same sort of payment schemes.
That there would be any reason at all for T2 to continue to offer an investment program that advertised a ludicrous return if its purported sale of websites could result in handsome, self-sustaining profits for the web-service venture. (Longtime PP Blog readers will recall that the AdViewGlobal (AVG) autosurf claimed at one time that it, too, was morphing into a company that would offer web services as a means of propping up an initial investment scheme. AVG, like ASD, promised to pay out half of what T2 claims. AVG disappeared in June 2009, only weeks after its morphing announcement.)
Also like ASD, T2 preemptively denied it was a Ponzi scheme, despite an absurd confluence of payment schemes in which T2 claimed an ability to pay an annualized return of 730 percent on top of recruitment commissions.
As previously noted, T2’s advertised return rate was double that of ASD, which prosecutors said had no meaningful revenue streams beyond payments by members. Those payments simply were recycled and returned to other ASD members in the form of classic Ponzi payouts.
Even though T2 — like ASD — purported to be changing its name, the name change appears to have hit a snag. T2 initially announced it would emerge as T2MoneyKlub on Feb. 1. That didn’t happen, according to Ponzi-forum chatter, because T2 did not have an AlertPay account in its new name.
T2, according to chatter, then defaulted back to its original name, a circumstance that apparently means the purported “opportunity” can both receive and send money, shelve its new name for the time being and reposition itself under its “old” name to reach into the pockets of new investors.
“Dave,” the purported operator of T2, according to Ponzi-forum chatter, once was a member of JSS Tripler, one of the entities referenced in the CONSOB action. It appears as though “Dave” was unmoved by the CONSOB action, so much so that he restarted JSS Tripler 2 even though claims about namesake JSS Tripler are under scrutiny and the already-radioactive name easily could become even more radioactive in the weeks ahead.
T2 payouts will come from “AlertPay, SolidTrustPay and LibertyReserve,” Dave announced on the MoneyMakerGroup Ponzi forum, posting as “Peakr8.” All three of the named processors have reputation for being friendly to fraud schemes. Both AlertPay and SolidTrustPay are referenced in court files in the ASD Ponzi case.
MoneyMakerGroup member “jieroz” quickly fired up an “I got paid” post for T2 today, saying the $25 payment had come from AlertPay.
“Congrats, that was fast … As usual . . .” strosdegoz blathered.
A poster purportedly from India and using the handle “hemsagar” also joined in the cheers.
“WTG! WTG!” he exclaimed in approval.
A link under the approving post of “hemsagar” led to a “benefactor” promotion in which he claims he’ll pay people to join T2 by sending them money through AlertPay.
Amid the cheerleading in the MoneyMakerGroup T2 thread, “Dave,” posting as “Peakr8,” announced he was taking a trip to “Cambodia.” This trip apparently follows on the heels of a trip “Dave” purportedly had taken earlier from England to Thailand during a period in which T2 was not paying members.
“Dave” conceded that T2’s restart had resulted in problems at T2’s in-house cheerleading forum.
“I know there are bugs, but we will stamp on em one by one when I get back from Cambodia,” Dave posted on MoneyMakerGroup as “Peakr8.”
Below that post, another post from “hemsagar” appears. Although his brief MoneyMakerGroup bio at the left of the post claims he is from India, his post about the bugs in the T2 forum makes this claim:
“Its back up here in the Ukraine.”
Whether “hemsagar” is a citizen of India now living in Ukraine is unclear.
Serial huckster “strosdegoz” later proclaimed “we need to pump up” the T2 forum and “also . . . every place else.
“I have to do my dozens of forums too,” strosdegoz acknowledged.
Regulators have warned the public repeatedly that scams involving hundreds of millions of dollars are spreading virally on the Internet through forums and social-media sites. Pathway to Prosperity, which was pushed on the Ponzi forums, eventually made its way to 120 countries, according to court filings.
The scheme had a take of more than $70 million and created at least 40,000 victims, according to court filings.
ASD may have created a similar number of victims, according to court filings. Legisi and Imperia Invest IBC also created victims by the thousands, investigators said.
Included in the Imperia victims’ count were thousands of people with hearing impairments, investigators said.
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 posts on MoneyMakerGroup as “ISPY” and published a link to the Blog on the forum to discredit him.
The PP Blog is not “ISPY” and does not post on MoneyMakerGroup under any identity. Nor does the Blog communicate with “ISPY” in any fashion, know his (or her) identity or encourage “ISPY” directly or indirectly to post links to the Blog. The Blog has never encouraged any member of MoneyMakerGroup — or any other Ponzi scheme forum — to post links to the Blog.
It is somewhat common for posters on Ponzi boards, including so-called “naysayers,” to post links to the Blog’s coverage of schemes-in-progress or schemes gone bust. It also is somewhat common for Ponzi board promoters to exhibit paranoia about the Blog’s reporting and even claim the Blog is part of a U.S. government operation.
Prior to asserting that “ISPY” was the PP Blog, “10BucksUp” accused ISPY of threatening him. ISPY denied threatening “10BucksUp.”
“10BucksUp” rose to Ponzi forum prominence as a pitchman and apologist for ClubAsteria, which became the subject of a probe by the Italian securities regulator CONSOB in May, had its PayPal account frozen, slashed weekly payouts to members and then eliminated the payouts.
Meanwhile, “10BucksUp” also acknowledged today that he was a member of the collapsed Cherry Shares HYIP. In June, Cherry Shares was referenced in freeze and trade orders brought by The Autorité des marchés financiers (AMF), the securities regulator for the province of Quebec in Canada.
The acknowledgement by “10BucksUp” of his Cherry Shares involvement means that he was participating in a second “program” that had come under government scrutiny — but nevertheless plowed headlong into JustBeenPaid.
Earlier this month, “10BucksUp” advised members of JustBeenPaid that late-entry members were engaging in hurtful and “drastic measures” if they filed disputes with AlertPay. Among other things, JustBeenPaid has asserted it is a “private association.”
The AdViewGlobal (AVG) autosurf made the same claim prior to its collapse in June 2009. AVG was one of the so-called AdSurfDaily clones — each of which launched (and collapsed) after the August 2008 seizure by the U.S. Secret Service of tens of millions of dollars in a Ponzi scheme investigation.
Today’s false MoneyMakerGroup claims about the PP Blog also occurred against the backdrop of a securities fraud case brought by the SEC against Jody Dunn, an alleged pitchman for Imperia Invest IBC. Imperia Invest also was promoted on MoneyMakerGroup and TalkGold, and the SEC charged that Dunn had promoted it blindly and relied on claims made by the purported opportunity, rather than conducting any actual due diligence.
Millions of dollars directed at Imperia Invest went missing, the SEC charged.
“You want to arrest me? [G]o ahead,” 10BucksUp wrote on MoneyMakerGroup today. “Send a Secret Service/US Seal/intergalactic commando force in my little 3rd world village. Afterall, that is what some Americans think of us right? We all should live under your whims, at what you dictate as legal and not illegal. And then when somebody else invoke that ‘power’ against you, you cry ‘dont tread on me’ or ‘taxed enough already[.”]
“Go ahead with your crusade, Mr ISPY/Patrick Pretty/Twerp,” 10BuckUp continued. “Clean up the world of garbages like us. There are millions of us. I hope you can finish up in your lifetime.”
10BucksUp did not say whether he believed U.S. and other world citizens unwise to the ways of the Ponzi pitchman should simply remain silent after they recognize they’ve been scammed and permit fraudsters to steal their money. Nor did he say whether he believed the U.S. government was making a mistake in prosecuting fraudsters who have disappeared with tens of millions of dollars in recent cases such as Legisi and Pathway to Prosperity — in an era of terrorism and economic uncertainty.
The combined haul of the Legisi, Pathway to Prosperity and ASD “opportunities” was about $250 million, according to court filings. Separately, the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA) said last year that Genius Funds, a collapsed HYIP, had gathered $400 million.
Like Club Asteria, JustBeenPaid and Cherry Shares, Legisi, Pathway To Prosperity, ASD, AVG and Genius Funds were promoted on the Ponzi boards.
FINRA specifically warned last year that HYIP fraud schemes spread on the Internet through social media and forums.
“10BucksUp” said today that he used a “a free, blogger blog” to promote Club Asteria. Blogger is part of Google’s Blogspot platform.
An Imperia Invest IBC promoter continued to make excuses and cloud the issues even after the SEC released printed warnings and warnings in American Sign Language that the purported opportunity was an international scam that stole millions of dollars from deaf investors and others, the agency said today. (See link to videocast below.)
ALERT >> MOVING: A deaf promoter of an online program that stole millions of dollars from deaf investors knew the purported Imperia Invest IBC opportunity did not come as advertised but nevertheless continued to promote it, siphoning money from fellow deaf investors and using it to make his mortgage, car, insurance and other payments, the SEC said.
Even after Imperia Invest was exposed as an obvious fraud that advertised a preposterous daily return that projected to an annual rate in the hundreds of percent, promoter Jody Myung Dunn insisted he was owed $163 million from his personal investment of $1,100, the SEC charged.
Dunn, 43, of Corinth, Texas, has no broker/dealer or securities credentials, and currently is unemployed and drawing disability benefits, the SEC said. He has been charged with securities fraud, selling unregistered securities and acting unlawfully as a broker or dealer amid charges that he blindly promoted an international scam that consumed more than $7 million and made at least $3.45 million belonging to his personal customers vanish.
In stunning allegations outlined today, the agency accused Dunn of acting as an Imperia rainmaker who recruited deaf investors into a quagmire. The purported opportunity was widely promoted on the Ponzi boards, including TalkGold and MoneyMakerGroup.
The SEC sued Imperia in October 2010, saying it was running a Traded Endowment Policies (TEP) scam. Dunn continued to make excuses for the scam even after the SEC released a printed Investor Alert and a videocast warning in American Sign Language, the SEC charged.
“Dunn was aware that Imperia lost investor money and was not accurately crediting investor accounts, yet he continued to send investor money to Imperia without disclosing to investors what was happening,” said Kenneth D. Israel, director of the SEC’s Salt Lake Regional Office. “To further take advantage of others in the deaf community, Dunn was siphoning off about 10 percent of the money he collected from investors to pay his own bills before sending the rest of money into the Imperia quagmire.”
Dunn, the SEC charged, formed a Nevada corporation known as Global Wealth Lifepath in May 2009 and established a bank account into which investors’ Imperia funds were deposited and then wired to Imperia. Meanwhile, Dunn started a second company — possibly outside the United States — and named it Dunn World Investments (DWI). A bank account established for DWI also was used as part of the Imperia fraud, the agency charged.
Despite red flags aplenty such as a purported guaranteed return of 1.2 percent a day, Dunn “blindly” promoted the Imperia scheme — even wiring money to bank accounts in Cyprus and New Zealand that had “no apparent or obvious link to Imperia,” the SEC charged.
About 7,133 deaf investors entrusted about $3.45 million to Dunn, who accepted their funds directly and scraped about $350,000 off the top, claiming to have sent the balance to Imperia’s offshore bank accounts, the SEC charged.
Although Dunn claimed “he had met and knew the individuals behind Imperia,” it was a lie, the SEC charged.
And in an allegation that may cause great discomfort to Ponzi board promoters, Dunn was accused of not conducting “even a minimum amount of due diligence” about Imperia, not confirming that the firm actually traded in TEPs and not confirming whether any required licensing or registration documentation existed, the SEC charged.
“Dunn testified that his only due diligence consisted of reading the Imperia website, attempting to verify Imperia’s URL address, and reviewing the information Imperia posted on its own website regarding its website host,” the SEC charged.
In his testimony, Dunn described Imperia as a “secretive company” that owed him $163 million in back commissions and interest on his investment of $1,100, the SEC charged.
Despite Imperia’s clandestine nature and Dunn’s inability even to find a verifiable street address for the company, Dunn still decided to plow headlong into the scheme and draft others into doing the same.
Imperia made off with at least $7 million, the SEC said last year.
UPDATED 12:09 P.M. EDT (U.S.A.) Federal prosecutors effectively advised U.S. District Judge Rosemary Collyer last month that enough people to fill a small city had filed remissions claims in the AdSurfDaily autosurf Ponzi case.
Although prosecutors did not reveal a precise number, they said in court filings that more than 11,000 people had filed claims and provided more than 150,000 pages of documentation. ASD was based in Quincy, Fla.
Remissions is a form of restitution. Prosecutors have said for more than two years that the government intends to compensate ASD victims from funds seized by the U.S. Secret Service in civil-forfeiture actions against ASD-related assets in 2008. Collyer issued civil judgments in the government’s favor totaling about $80 million in 2009 and 2010. Bowdoin was charged criminally with wire fraud, securities fraud and selling unregistered securities in December 2010.
ASD created Ponzi victims all over the world, prosecutors have said. The claims number alone greatly exceeds the Gadsden County community of Quincy’s population of roughly 7,000. It also greatly exceeds the population of Perry, the 7,000-inhabitant Florida town in Taylor County Bowdoin once represented as a council member and mayor.
The claims number would consume nearly 80 percent of combined populations of Perry and Quincy. Looking at the number a different way, had ASD’s membership consisted only of residents of those two communities in separate counties, only one in five inhabitants — 20 percent — would be left untouched by the scheme. Had the 80 percent of residents who filed claims lost significant sums in ASD, the economies of both cities could have been brought to their knees.
Among the core dangers of autosurf schemes is that criminals — domestic and international — establish means by which they can tap into bank accounts, payment processing accounts and credit accounts at the local level. When a scheme collapses, it may affect commerce far and wide while also putting banks in multiple communities in possession of tainted cash. By some accounts, large numbers of members of individual churches became ASD members.
A collapsed autosurf scheme not only may affect individual churches, it may affect the finances of the church itself and the commerce stream in reach of the church and its members. One 2008 promo for ASD and a purported “millionaire” advertising co-op viewed by the PP Blog as part of its reporting encouraged members (verbatim, text coloring added by PP Blog) to:
Go to your nearest ATM machine Use your Debit card to withdraw the necessary cash for your payment OR Use your Credit card to make a “cash advance” of the necessary funds for your payment. Note: there is usually a much higher Annual Percentage Rate for a credit card cash advance. Take the cash to your nearest branch of Bank of America and deposit the cash amount in the AdSurfDaily, Inc. account, using the following information:
The promo appeared on a website linked to Tari Steward, whom Bowdoin has identified as a potential defense witness and the Internet Marketer behind an effort by Bowdoin to raise funds to pay for his criminal defense.
Screen shot: From a 2008 promo for an ASD millionaire co-op.
The U.S. government warned in December 2010 that securities schemes such as AdSurfDaily and Imperia Invest IBC that spread virally on the Internet were creating tens of thousands of victims at a time. Imperia, which was smashed by the SEC in October 2010, was targeted at people with hearing impairments and gathered millions of dollars.
Noobing, an autosurf that became popular after the ASD-related bank-account seizures in 2008 and collapsed in 2009 after the FTC took action against its parent company, also was targeted at the deaf community. Internet-based crimes and scams are creating victims in numbers America’s largest sports stadiums cannot accommodate, according to records.
ASD gathered at least $110 million in its scheme and may have created 40,000 or more victims, prosecutors have said, asserting in January 2011 that “as far as the Government is aware, there is no available accurate compilation” of all individuals or entities that lost money in the scheme.
“It appears from the investigation that there may be members who provided funds to ASD but whose information ASD did not enter into its database,” prosecutors said in January.
Bowdoin, with Steward’s reported assistance, has busied himself since June to raise funds online for his criminal defense from the members he is accused of defrauding. A web entity known as “Andy’s Fundraising Army” has been sending “blast” emails for weeks to a list of ASD members that purportedly contains 77,000 names.
Bowdoin also announced plans to complement his “Andy’s Army” fundraising efforts with a Facebook site, but no such site appears to have launched on the popular social network. At least three advertised launch dates for the Facebook site were missed.
Meanwhile, the “Andy’s Army” bid appears to have fallen flat, with Bowdoin stuck more than 95 percent short of his $500,000 goal after five continuous weeks of formal fundraising. Some ASD members have said they had received multiple fundraising appeals from Bowdoin in a single week.
Screen shot: From the 2008 "millionaire" co-op promo.
The 'Insectrio' HYIP used the logos of the MoneyMakerGroup, TalkGold and DreamTeamMoney Ponzi forums in its sales pitch.
UPDATE:(UPDATED 11:53 A.M. EDT (U.S.A.) RealScam.com is reporting that the website of a bizarre HYIP known as “Insectrio” will not resolve.
As the PP Blog reported on May 27, Insectrio was emerging as a darling on the Ponzi boards. The purported “opportunity” even used a graphic showing the logos of TalkGold, MoneyMakerGroup and DreamTeamMoney in its vomitous sales pitch.
Insectrio advertised an “Egg” plan purported to pay 103 percent after one day, a “Larva” plan purported to pay 120 percent after five days and other plans advertised to pay even more. It was enabled by the offshore processors LibertyReserve and PerfectMoney, both of which are listed in the SEC’s October 2010 complaint against Imperia Invest IBC as processors that allegedly gathered money for Imperia.
Imperia was accused to stealing millions of dollars from deaf people. Its “program” also was promoted on the Ponzi boards.
Efforts to popularize Insectrio on the Ponzi boards were beginning at roughly the same time the popularity of Club Asteria was waning on the fraud cesspits. Club Asteria targeted its offer to the world’s poor. It reportedly suspended payouts weeks ago, although some members of the Ponzi boards say they continue to get paid through AlertPay, a Canadian processor.
BULLETIN: A Delaware company accused by the CFTC in January of illegally hawking Forex offers has been hit with a $280,000 penalty and ordered to remove its Forex solicitation pages from the Internet.
U.S. District Judge James B. Zagel of the Northern District of Illinois entered the order against ForInvest Group of Delaware. ForInvest also is known as ForInvests Group LLC.
ForInvest also was banned permanently “from engaging in any commodity-related activity, including trading, and from registering or seeking exemption from registration with the CFTC,” the CFTC said.
The company was one of 14 Forex outfits sued by the CFTC in what was described as a nationwide sweep of unregistered firms illegally targeting U.S. residents.
ForInvest advertised that it accepted payments via Perfect Money, a murky firm purportedly based in Panama that allegedly was used by a company that defrauded thousands of deaf investors in a scheme known as Imperia Invest IBC. The SEC said in October 2010 that Imperia Invest had stolen millions of dollars from investors.
In the same CFTC sweep, the agency also sued InstaTrade Corp., doing business as InstaForex. InstaForex is an advertiser on the TalkGold Ponzi scheme and criminals forum, and research showed that InstaForex — like Imperia Invest and ForInvest — also used Perfect Money.
Imperia Invest and InstaForex also were promoted on TalkGold and other Ponzi forums, according to records.
Zagel ordered “[a]ny person or entity providing web-hosting or domain name registration services” for ForInvest to preserve documents and “[a]ny person or entity providing web-hosting or domain name registration services to “remove or cause to be removed from the Internet all webpages within their control . . .”
Exotic FX, an HYIP promoted on the Ponzi scheme and criminals’ forums by members of the Club Asteria HYIP, has collapsed. Exotic billed itself a “PRIVATE ASSET HAVEN.” The dollar value of member losses is unclear, and the firm’s website no longer loads.
Chatter on Ponzi boards such as TalkGold and MoneyMakerGroup also suggests that ClubAsteria is in a free-fall, although the Virginia-based firm continues to wax on about its “deep philosophical commitment.” Some Club Asteria members have claimed a $19.95 monthly payment to the firm returns $400 a week.
Club Asteria lists its managing director as Andrea Lucas, “former Director of the World Bank.”
The news of the Exotic FX collapse comes on the heels of news that H. David Kotz, the inspector general for the Securities and Exchange Commission, opened a probe earlier this year into the actions of an SEC employee who was a member of Imperia Invest IBC, yet another fraud scheme promoted on TalkGold and MoneyMakerGroup.
Imperia stole millions of dollars from thousands of deaf investors, the SEC charged last year.
In October, the PP Blog published a story about the dramatic, emergency action the SEC filed against Imperia. Some Imperia supporters came to the Blog to defend the firm and insist the SEC had no jurisdiction.
One of Imperia’s supporters claimed a “retireed (sic) exec of the World Bank” had vetted Imperia. The supporter did not identify the retired World Bank executive.
In the murky world of HYIPs, there often is connectivity among scams. Promoters race from scheme to scheme to scheme, injecting fraud proceeds from one scam into another scam. Because the scams “pay” in their early stages to build credibility — and because money from the scams get deposited into banks — the banks come into possession of fraud proceeds.
See Oct. 7, 2010, story on the SEC’s action against Imperia Invest. (Make sure you read the comments thread below the story.)
BULLETIN: An employee of the SEC at its Washington headquarters was a member of a fraud scheme under investigation by the agency and shared misleading information about its ongoing probe with other investors, according to a report to Congress by SEC Inspector General H. David Kotz.
The document does not reveal the employee’s name or his job title. Nor does it identify the scheme by name.
But a date cited in the document matches the date of a dramatic action the SEC’s regional office in Utah filed in October 2010 against Imperia Invest IBC, an extremely murky firm that used “fake” offshore addresses, targeted thousands of deaf investors and stole millions of dollars without returning “a single penny,” according to records. A second date cited in the Kotz document matches the date the SEC obtained a judgment against Imperia.
The Imperia case has been discussed in Washington’s highest power corridors. It was specifically referenced by President Obama’s Financial Fraud Enforcement Task Force in December 2010 as a firm targeted in Operation Broken Trust, a government action aimed at a broad array of investment-fraud schemes that had drained the U.S. economy of billions of dollars.
Kotz opened a probe into the matter after receiving information from “a regional office senior official that an employee at SEC headquarters was providing false, misleading, and nonpublic information to investors about an active enforcement investigation and litigation from as early as October 2010 to February 2011,” according to Kotz’s semiannual report to Congress made public yesterday.
“The regional office senior official was concerned that the employee’s actions not only threatened to jeopardize the ongoing investigation, but also misled several investors into believing that the purported company was legitimate,” according to the Kotz report. “Moreover, some or all of the investors knew that the employee worked at the SEC and, therefore, believed incorrectly that he had first-hand knowledge of the SEC’s investigation and that his representations were credible. After the regional office senior official e-mailed the employee and inquired as to whether he was communicating with investors about the investigation, the employee was placed on administrative leave.”
Kotz’s office reviewed “nearly 10,000 e-mails” as part of the probe and “took the employee’s sworn testimony,” according to the report. Internet postings also were reviewed, along with transcripts, court records and “other relevant information.”
“The [Office of Inspector General] found that the employee, by his own admission, communicated with several investors during the SEC’s investigation of, and litigation against, the purported company,” according to the report. “In so doing, the employee shared nonpublic, false, and misleading information with investors.
“As a result, the OIG found that his conduct not only confused certain investors and gave them a false sense of hope, but it also had the potential to adversely affect an ongoing enforcement investigation,” according to the report.
Imperia Invest was accused by the SEC of siphoning the money into offshore accounts.
The Financial Markets Authority of New Zealand (FMA) has joined regulators in the United States, Canada and the United Kingdom in issuing a warning on the Profitable Sunrise HYIP “program.” New Zealand’s warning also extends to NJF Global Group, which appears to be a Profitable Sunrise recruitment organization operating from the United States. (More below.)
BULLETIN: A Delaware company accused by the CFTC in January of illegally hawking Forex offers has been hit with a $280,000 penalty and ordered to remove its Forex solicitation pages from the Internet.
