English:

Some member asked me by email what I think about Imperiainvest and I want to give you my opinion here.

First of all I imagine that you heard this sentence before: “if something is too good to be truth then it´s not true.”

Well, do you really think that paying $50 you will receive $80.000?. And some other nonsenses:

“In conclusion it is to say that a TEP investor can receive a loan of 80,000 US$ with a one-time investment of US$ 50. Plain And simple. This loan should be used for trading on the financial markets emphatically. We have created a proper platform for that issue to give you daily profits of 1.2%, which are guaranteed by money market arbitrage situations.”

1,2% daily trading in arbitrage???, their own platform?. It´s too much for me and for someone else. If that was true then all of us would be millionaires!.

It´s a total scam based in Global Pension Plan idea. I think that they will receive a lot of members paying $50 and when they get enough money then they will dissapear without paying 1 cent. As you know many people will pay $50 because it´s few money with the illusion to receive that great amount. Don´t do it: you will lose this $50 and of course forget your illusions to be paid.

Español:

Un miembro de este programa me preguntaba por email mi opinión sobre Imperiainvest y quería dar mi opinión aquí.

Lo primero es que imagino que ya has oido alguna vez esta frase: “si algo es muy bueno para ser verdad entonces no es verdad”

Bien, ¿de verdad pensáis que pagando $50 vais a conseguir $80.000?. Y algunas otras tonterías:

“Concluyendo se puede decir que un inversor TEP puede recibir un préstamo de $80.000 con una simple inversión de $50. Así de simple. Este préstamo debería usarse posteriormente para tradear en los mercados financieros. Hemos creado la plataforma apropiada para ello y para daros unos beneficios diarios del 1,2%”, que son garantizados por situaciones dadas en el mercado de dinero por arbitraje.”

¿1,2% diario en arbitraje?, ¿su propia plataforma?. Es demasiado para mi y para cualquiera. Si eso fuera cierto todos seríamos millonarios.

Es un scam total basado en la idea de Global Pension Plan. Creo que captarán muchos clientes pagando esos $50 porque se trata de poco dinero con la ilusión de conseguir una gran cantidad. No lo hagas: perderás estos $50 y por supuesto olvida la ilusión de que te paguen.

Thanks a lot to TraderJ for all these files and information that you can download from my server in a zip file:

Legisi

As I know Greg McKnight has been charged but the case has not began yet. The thinking is that he will get 10 years once it´s all over but who knows… the SEC just closed him down some days ago and it is the beginning of this process.

Thanks to member okosh who posted in Jude´s Forum about this news. I want to share it with my readers too:

Greg McKnight (Legisi´s Admin) has been indicted!

I posted about this program before in this post.

When some people invest a great sum of money into these ponzis they always think that those bad news are not true (I am sure you are also one of these if you have been scammed before), they maintain the hope to receive a refund from these scam artists and they also trust them until it´s too late. Meanwhile some of these scammers are sending your funds to different locations/digital accounts, thinking how to avoid authorities, or simply dissapearing from the map.

Others simply never show his/her real name, using anonymous proxys to hide the IP and the real country where they live. But this is not the case with Greg McKnight. He even showed his real name and identification to some investors and so he gained their confidence. You could even read his real name and address in the whois of the domain, a very strange case.

Please avoid hyips like a plague. If you want to invest your funds there are other solutions. For example you can open your own forex account where nobody can withdraw your money except yourself, and then you can find a good trader to make a reliable profit paying him a monthly fee.

Sunday, May 04, 2008 / FBI

SACRAMENTO, Calif.-United States Attorney McGregor W. Scott announced that JOEL NATHAN WARD, 49, of Turlock, California, was sentenced today by United States District Judge Garland E. Burrell, Jr. to nine years in prison for masterminding a Ponzi scheme in which nearly 100 investors lost over $11 million. WARD was also ordered to pay restitution in the amount of $11,275,501.53 and to serve three years of supervised release after the completion of his prison sentence. He was remanded into custody immediately following the sentencing hearing.

This case is the product of an extensive joint investigation by the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the Internal Revenue Service-Criminal Investigation Division.

The Commodity Futures Trading Commission, the federal agency that regulates commodity futures and options markets in the United States, has noted the sharp rise and increasing complexity of foreign currency exchange (forex) trading scams. WARD, a frequent commentator and seminar speaker on forex trading, ran an elaborate forex trading scam through an investment fund he controlled called the Joel Nathan ForexFund.

According to Assistant United States Attorneys Benjamin B. Wagner and Ellen V. Endrizzi, who prosecuted the case, sentencing documents filed in the case show that WARD offered investors the opportunity to invest in the foreign exchange interbank spot market through his fund. Between early 2003 and November 2006, WARD took in over $15 million from investors. Of that, about 85% was diverted to other purposes, including promoting WARDs business interests, salary, travel and other expenses, and purchasing a foreign exchange trading school in Sacramento called Learn:Forex. WARD also used about $3.7 million to make Ponzi payments back to investors who sought to withdraw funds. According to trading records, he only actually traded about $2 million, and lost virtually all of it in the foreign exchange market. WARD concealed his diversion of funds by sending false account statements to investors purporting to show trading profits. He also defrauded investors in a second scheme relating to a purported real estate investment project in Mississippi. Nearly 100 investors lost a total of over $11.3 million.

Joel Nathan Ward earned every minute of the nine-year sentence the court imposed. He brazenly defrauded scores of victims out of over $11 million, stated US Attorney Scott.

Several victims spoke during the sentencing hearing, telling the judge about the financial devastation caused by WARDs conduct, and their hopes for restitution. In sentencing WARD today, Judge Burrell stated that WARD defrauded many people. He caused losses over $11 million, and many investors suffered devastating losses.

The defendant had proposed that he be allowed to remain out of prison while he attempted to generate funds to repay investors. In rejecting that plan, Judge Burrell stated that the magnitude of his crimes, the manner in which the economic crimes were committed and concealed, and the duration of the criminal activities required a lengthy prison sentence.

Interview with the trader: 

http://www.modbee.com/local/story/253956.html

More news:

Bloomberg

Usnews

Modbee

Findlaw

The National Bureau of Investigation, Finland’s central criminal police, has started an investigation into the activities of the WinClub “investment club”. The NBI says that up to 10,000 people had made on-line investments in the club. The total value of the investments exceeds EUR 50 million. 

Individual investors may have lost thousands and even tens of thousands of euros in investments. The website of the on-line investment community was shut down at the beginning of this month. Only a few criminal complaints have been made so far. 

The “investment club” operated for several years, and at least a few of the investors actually made a profit.

The NBI says that it has reason to suspect that a number of crimes were committed in connection with WinClub, and its successor WinCapita. The aim of the ongoing investigation is to establish whether or not the activities constitute a pyramid scheme. 

The authorities are asking that people who feel that they have been the victim of a crime after investing in WinCapita to report their suspicions to the local police.

Some more information in this website

You can also read what wikipedia has posted about Wincapita:

Wincapita, previously Winclub, was an Internet based investment and multi-level marketing company that is alleged to be a Ponzi scheme. It operated on Finnish market. 

The company presented itself as an invitation-only investment club that required an initial investment of several thousand Euros, while promising up to 400% returns in investment initial. 

The investment company has been in operation since 2005. The web site of the company was abruptly closed in March 2008. 

According to Finnish National Bureau of Investigation, who began investigating the activities of the company in late March 2008, approximately 10.000 people lost their investment. The total amount of money lost is over 50 million Euros.  

In the early part of the operations, the returns were paid normally, in order to draw in more investors. The company itself was registered in Panama.

Take a look at the updates in Jude´s Forum and Blog about this ponzi if you think to recover your funds from it.

Starting from this blog entry, please comment on how much have you spent on Club-FX with your email contacts and I’ll add you to the list.

Either we get back our money or we’ll report everything to the relevant authorities where Peter Buchner is residing in.

You can read more in these links:

http://nobsnetwork.net/no-bullshit-hyip-blog/907-club-fx-recovery-plan.html

http://hyipblog.nobshyip.net/2007/05/23/club-fx-trader-recovery-plan/

http://hyipblog.nobshyip.net/2008/01/02/club-fx-recovery-plan-2/

If you were an investor scammed by the Admin of Fx-Experts (Marcos Matos) you will find his real documentation in Jude´s Blog, here is the link:

http://hyipblog.nobshyip.net/2007/09/29/fx-experts-matos-marcos-information/

I was also an investor in this program but I invested few money: about $250, and although compounding my money my balance was higher maybe it´s a waste of time to recover my money with this little amount.

I hope you can make what you consider necessary to retrieve your funds. I am tired of scammers yet.

If you are/were an investor of this program I would like to know if it´s working with Managed Accounts or not yet (he finished with the Pool some time ago), and if you are receiving news from the Admin.

As I know the website is not working and emails are being returned without an answer, so I think that this program has dissapeared as many other programs out there. I know that this Admin was really trading (I entered in one of his Forex accounts to check it) but as you must know it is not a proof nowadays if the Admin of some program is not a honest person.

The good news are that I have the documentation of this Admin and if he has dissapeared completely I can send you his documents and you will do what you consider necessary to retrieve your funds, but first I need a proof to show me that you were a real investor in this program.

He began telling the investors that he was losing in his trading because it was not going well the carry trade strategy, then he promised to return the funds in some months, not the profit: only the funds. In my Forum I was helping these investors and thinking what to do because we considered him a scammer who wanted to make some profit with the funds of other people, not giving profit and only returning the money.

Well, he really returned some funds in the first months but now he has dissapeared (the website is not working and emails are being returned). All investors and myself never saw a proof of his losses (and he didn´t want to show it) and the investors decided that it was better to wait for these partial returns than contacting a lawyer.

In a private section into my Forum I have posted a link to all investors that I know they were in this program to download the documents of this Admin.

My position is to give his documents to the investors who could have lost money with him. Although I promised him not sending his documents to anybody it was supposed that it was in other conditions, not scamming people.

Please if you have some news from this Admin contact me.

Thanks.

KUALA LUMPUR, Sept 27 (Bernama) — The Securities Commission (SC) has achieved a breakthrough in its civil enforcement case against the Swisscash Internet investment scheme when it secured a court order to direct one of the defendants, Amir Hassan, to transfer back to Malaysia all Swisscash monies held in bank accounts overseas within seven days.

About RM35 million is currently held in six bank accounts in Hong Kong and eight bank accounts in Singapore, the SC in a statement here today.

“As Swisscash is a worldwide scam that operates in the borderless Internet realm, the SC is working closely with regulators from seven other countries to combat these illegal activities,” the commission said.

“This cross-jurisdictional collaboration has led to the discovery of valuable information that has facilitated investigations,” it added.

Once transferred back to Malaysia, the monies will be subject to the worldwide Mareva freezing orders pending the outcome of civil proceedings filed by the SC earlier this year against Amir Hassan, Albert Lee Kee Sien, Kelvin Choo Mun Hoe, Dynamic Revolution Sdn Bhd, Swiss Mutual Fund (1948) SA, SMF International Ltd and SMF (1948) International Ltd.

“This achievement in SC’s civil proceedings ensures that Swisscash monies are held safely, and within the jurisdiction of the Malaysian courts so they can be subject to any order made in the proceedings,” the commission said.

“Investors are again reminded that neither Swiss Mutual Fund nor Swisscash are licensed by the SC,” it said.

To date, the SC has blocked four websites related to Swisscas, namely www.swisscash.net, www.swisscash.biz, www.swissmutualfund.biz, and www.swisscashguide.com.

The commission said it would continue to take all measures to combat investment scams, including blocking access to more websites, and taking appropriate enforcement action against its operators and agents.

I don’t know if you read one article that I posted some time ago about what I considered a new strategy from scammers, please take your time to read it here

I don’t know if PeterB read my post to get the idea but I think that he is using the same strategy to scam all his investors.

It’s an intelligent method to scam people and be out of jail, and of course most of the investors will try to keep their mouths closed hoping to receive their funds, although they will not gain a profit with it.

So, a scammer can make profit with the funds of the investors while he is only returning the original deposit from time to time. And even he can be considered a hero saving the funds with some excuses without a proof: e-gold hacking, change in laws, SEC, etc…

If a scammer tells you one of these excuses please: TRY TO GET A PROOF!!, I am sure that these scammers will not show you a real proof of hacking or something like that. In this example with Club-FX, PeterB has not showed a real proof (and what he showed seems to be a false e-gold screenshot without more explanations) , he has not opened the Forex account in read-only mode to show all his investors some proof of trading or history in this bad situation: NOTHING.

Is it difficult to let the investors enter as read-only to see if he was getting 20% monthly as he was claiming or anything else?: NO

Perhaps it was only a bad Forex Trader who lost a lot of money and this is his solution to recover the funds. Who knows…

But… do you really think that he is telling the truth?