UPDATE 2:49 P.M. EST (U.S.A.) At a gathering of creditors today, Irving Picard, the trustee overseeing the liquidation of Bernard L. Madoff Investment Securities, said he could find no evidence that Madoff even purchased securities for customers in the past 13 years. Cash came in — and immediately went out — to sustain the Ponzi, Picard said. We’ve added a Madoff Discussion Topic at the bottom of this post.

Here, below, our earlier post . . .

This is a discussion thread for readers to share their views on developments in the autosurf world. Offer your opinions on any of the discussion topics below — or even all of them.

First, however, some news:

The bankruptcy judge in the CEP Ponzi scheme case has ordered some large judgments against “winners” who were sued in adversarial proceedings by William Perkins, the CEP receiver.

Judge James E. Massey even ordered interest be paid on the judgment amounts. “Winners” who are now losers include:

• Chris Barany: $225,702.90
• Earl Reed: $146,677.50
• Ginger Phillips Reed: $103,339.70
• Jessica Phillips: $44,821.85

As a side note, our research suggests that AdSurfDaily President Andy Bowdoin was a participant in the CEP Ponzi scheme. ASD once advertised it accepted payments from CEP Trust, the failed payment processor owned by the operators of the CEP Ponzi scheme.

DISCUSSION TOPIC: If you’ve been following the ASD case, you’ve read that ASD was an exciting, new business model and Andy Bowdoin a genius. But how could that be true if ASD was a member of other autosurf Ponzi schemes?

Ponzis And The Deaf

As reported on PonziNews, the SEC has taken action against a Hawaii-based firm that allegedly ran a Ponzi scheme targeting the hearing-impaired communities of the United States and Japan.

Investigators say Billion Coupons Inc., run by Marvin Cooper, made affinity fraud part of a $4.4 million Ponzi scheme.

“A Ponzi scheme targeting members of the Deaf community is particularly reprehensible,” said Rosalind R. Tyson, director of the SEC’s Los Angeles Regional Office.

This week, a surf came under fire in forums for slashing payouts to customers. The surf, known as Noobing, targeted the deaf at Deaf Expo events in 2008 and in YouTube videos.

DISCUSSION TOPIC: Given customers’ claims of “bait and switch,” the fact Noobing launched after the government seized ASD’s assets, Noobing’s statement that people should be angry at the government — not Noobing — for its decision to slash payouts, and the targeting of deaf people, is an investigation warranted?

Andy Bowdoin

Two months have passed since prosecutors filed a second forfeiture complaint against assets tied to ASD. The complaint alleged that ASD funds were used to fuel big spending by Bowdoin family members. It further alleged that $1 million purportedly was stolen from ASD by “Russian” hackers and that Bowdoin didn’t file a police report. Meanwhile, it also alleged that money in addition to what “Russian” hackers took also was stolen — and that Bowdoin didn’t file a police report about those thefts, either.

ASD said it had more than $1 million on deposit in Antigua, which this week became the center of an international financial scandal involving billionaire Allen Stanford, the biggest banker on the Caribbean island. Customers flooded banks in the tiny nation to withdraw money, and the government of Antigua appealed for calm.

Last summer, Bowdoin told a federal judge that ASD needed money to operate and asked her to free up seized funds. But Bowdoin didn’t tell the judge about the money in Antigua until after prosecutors pointed it out. After prosecutors revealed the presence of the Antigua money, Bowdoin explained in a conference call that the cash — at least $500,000 of it — was a deposit so ASD could process credit-card orders.

But the account was in a name other than ASD.

DISCUSSION TOPIC: Did Andy Bowdoin get the money out of Antigua before the onset of the banking crisis? Why was the money in a name other than ASD’s if it was used to process credit cards for ASD? Why didn’t Bowdoin repatriate the money and use it to pay ASD employees and restart the company?

Surf’s Up

On Nov. 27, ASD offered the Surf’s Up forum its official endorsement. This was several days after ASD lost the evidentiary hearing and several days before major prelaunch buzz for AdViewGlobal (AVG) began.

With ASD’s endorsement in hand, some of the Surf’s Up Mods and members started a new site on ning.com to promote AVG. For its part, AVG says it has no ties to ASD, even though the two companies share a common executive, a common customer-service representative, and AVG’s graphics once appeared on a webroom operated by ASD — and AVG listed its street address as ASD’s street address in Quincy.

DISCUSSION TOPIC: Should Surf’s Up have accepted the endorsement? Does it make sense to promote yet-another surf, especially when the surf has clear ties to ASD?

BizAdSplash

Despite all the upheaval in the financial world — and despite the fact the Feds are working harder than ever to expose Ponzi schemes — BizAdSplash says things are going just fine. Yesterday it announced a new promotion: 100 percent matching bonuses for customers and sponsors.

Here is the announcement:

Over the past week we have had a number of you contact us about your initial deposit and that you only purchased a small amount of Ad Packages just to test the system. Now you are ready to make a larger purchase. Your question is can we get the 100% match or discount on the cost of a larger Ad Package. Biz Ad Splash has agreed to open a small window for this 100% additional match. Any new purchases made from outside the system will be given the same benefit as your initial purchase and will be given the 100% match along with the sponsor match. This is only on purchases made on February 23 through February 28. This is a tremendous opportunity for all our Biz Ad Splash advertisers.

Thank you for your patience while we are in our beta launch. We value your participation in Biz Ad Splash and we look forward to exceeding your expectations.

The Biz Ad Splash Team

DISCUSSION TOPIC: Is BizAdSplash, which launched only a short time ago, already hurting? Is it desperately trying to collect cash to survive? How can it possibly fund payouts for customers and sponsors when the 100 percent matching bonuses create so much extra liability?

Will the surf hide behind “rebates aren’t guaranteed” if things go South? If that happens, will surf participants still think “offshore” surfing is the ticket to prosperity?

And how can any of the new surfs — BizAdSplash, AdviewGlobal, AdGateWorld — expect to thrive when they are fundamentally competing for the same business in a world in which many governments are going after Ponzi schemes with exceptional vigor?

Bernard Madoff

Trustee Irving Piccard now says that Bernard Madoff didn’t even purchase securities for customers in the past 13 years, instead taking incoming money to pay off older investors in a virtually pure Ponzi scheme.

DISCUSSION TOPIC: Given that Madoff escaped detection for years — and given that Allen Stanford appears to have escaped detection for years — are you worried that other Ponzi shoes may drop?