Fucking $25 Thousand GONE!! Fucked by Ponzi Scheme
 

words can not express how I feel right now. what took me over two years to save up is now completely GONE and nothing I can do about it. Plus, $2k in lawyer fees for nothing. Found out this morning that my chance of ever seeing a dime is slim to nill :mad::mad::mad::mad::mad::mad::mad::mad::mad:

So about four years ago a close friend introduced me to a good friend of his. Someone he has known since childhood and has been in the finance and accounting world for years. A couple of years before that, he has been independently managing clients financing and investments, including a number of pro basketball players.

Prior I had my money in CD's with BofA, which was getting about 5%ish a year. I was asking him about what he did and he told me that he can get about 8-10% return a year guaranteed or 20% in a high risk. I took him up on the offer for the 8-10% guaranteed and gave him $25k. He told me it was all stocks, forex, etc., seemed 100% legit and he showed me some proof of what he did.

Around February '09 I heard a rumor that him and his partner got car repo'd that they were lending to someone else (another friend). My friend said he has been sending them the money payments but the repo company said they haven't gotten a payment in months. This through up a couple red flags and I called the guy I had the investments with and said I needed to cash out ASAP.

He told me he would get me the money within about 3 weeks, needed to cash out some stocks but it would be done. Weeks went by, no response. Kept calling and calling and kept getting excuses. Were now into April and I find out from the friend who introduced me that he is involved in a ponzi scheme. He found out because the guy told his wife who told my friend so he could try and get his money out.

We both have been trying, zero luck. I contacted the police, there is nothing they can do (seriously???) He is being investigated by the FBI, but we are told it would take years before we would see any money, and that is if we are extremely lucky :Oh crap

So now I'm raging about this. $25k is a HUGE amount to me, just about everything I had. I was planning to use that for a wedding and down payment for a condo, but now I'm fucked and almost back at 0.

Fucked up world this is. Someone can steal $25 THOUSAND fucking dollars (just from me!) and theres a good chance he will get away scott free. If I were to go after him, I would be in jail.

Yes, I know I should of had a physical signed agreement but I didnt. I wired the money to him and the bank said "sorry, nothing we can do after 1 year." I trusted both my friend and his friend and now paying for giving someone my trust. last time that ever happens

Karma, you better have something really fucking good planned for me :321GFY

Sorry dude.

My ex stole close to $20k in cash from me ... bank surveillance tapes to prove it ... took forever to get charges pressed and then they dropped them the day of the trial.

It seems like financial crimes are A-OK in America these days.

UNLESS you're black and stealing a few dollars ... then it's a decade in jail.

The dude must be white?! That is when we should be playing guess the race ... when somebody does something illegal and gets away with it.

wire me 50k and I will get you back 75k at the end of the year. No really!

The physical signed agreement wouldn't have done anything. You just plain out got fucked. Hopefully someday he will get his.

On another note, investments like that should be more of a long-term thing. Don't invest wedding and condo monies in something that could even potentially be risky. Invest with money you don't need to survive.

Go find a punching bag, I have a feeling you'll need it.

Goddamn dude, that's really rough. I hope you get your money back, or at least some justice.

There's no such thing as a free lunch..

Well it takes some guts to admit to being taken like that. Most people just stay silent because they don't want their friends and family to know they were scammed.

When I was much younger I was also taken by a similar scam. Just learn from it I guess and try to become so successful that the $25k becomes a distant memory.:2 cents:

I'm pretty speechless

that sucks, always do the homework.

if it was a ponzi scheme a written agreement is done just for show.... still, really fucked up!

Another thing, when it comes to investments it is my personal policy NOT to trust friends or family since I KNOW they can be easily deceived (and have been over the years) ... but thats just me....

Sorry to hear bout ur misfortune dude....

Ouch, damn dude ... wow, that truly sucks.

You got that right. In this case a pretty pricey lunch though.

Id rather let people know then to be in my situation. sucks either way

sad thing is I did. I talked to clients of his that he had for years. looked at how he was generating income.

if it was 10% a month, i would of walked away. if it seems to good to be true, most likely is.

Good advice. It's also not a good idea to go to someone just because a friend recommended them. If your friend told you a guy got him 15% in one year and then the next year he loses his shirt he might be too embarrassed to tell you. We do a lot of research into other professionals we use but just go by a friend's advice for who we should trust our life savings with. :(

"I took him up on the offer for the 8-10% guaranteed"

Is too good to be true unfortunately.

Man I hope you get it back somehow.

i was hoping this thread was a joke.

that sucks man.

believe me, I wish it was too :(

i found out the guys address and he lives now in Michigan. debating on whether I want to pay him a visit or not, but I doubt that will do any good.

if I were to get it back, id throw a party :thumbsup

sucks to hear man. tuff lesson learned. (well hopefully you know better now.)

Learn from it and move on. Keep some people on it and if for some odd reason you get some money back that's a bonus. Otherwise just move forward. There is no going back. So don't bother looking back.

That's total BS. You can at the very least take him to court. You gave him $25k, for a service. You have the proof to back up the claim to that service.

For starters, it's illegal to just "give" someone $25k. So it's not like anyone or any company can tell you the money is lost. Either you illegally gave him $25k because you liked him, or you legally gave him $25k for services. Considering the statements you can get from your friends, and no proof of you just throwing $25k to him illegally because you thought his shoes were cool. You have a pretty decent case.

So I would say you can at the very least sue him for the money. You have the physical bank statements proving the transfer. As well as statements from friends, etc. Suing someone is always a pita though, as even if you win it's still hard to regain the money from the settlement.

I would contact a lawyer though as well. Sit down with someone, or even more than one to get some different opinions. See what types of laws and cases reflect your problem and situation and what other legal options you might have.

I guess it goes without saying, but man - Think of the paper work you have to go through just to buy an item in the $5-10k range from a reputable store. You should of had ten times the amount of paperwork handing over $25k or your own personal savings. I at least hope you made the payment to a business name, and certainly not to a person?

You made a huge mistake, but I wish the best that you find a way to retrieve your money.

if they offer more then 8% in return its always fishy
Pay attention to my sig!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

#1. does he even have any money left over to get back??

Here's the thing ... with a 5-8% return, OP wasn't being greedy by investing his money.

Now if he had taken the 20% guaranteed option, I wouldn't feel sorry.

5-8% is easily obtained by anybody that knows what they're doing and if an established investor tells me they can do that and shows me authentic enough looking paperwork, he is getting my money.

Not all of it, but some of it, until he proves the returns. That's still the thing though ... sophisticated guys running a ponzi scheme are going to give you the returns you need until they get all of your cash.

I'm sorry man I cant imagine loosing 25K like that. My best wishes for a swift recovery.

I would be asking Karma what I DID to deserve this... If you actually believe in Karma that is.

Sorry about the loss. Keep your head up.

i watched a show the other day, some guy ponzi'd a bunch of non profit organizations 35 + million and only got like 6-8 years in jail

What did you say when you contacted the police? Why can't you file criminal charges against him? Anything more than $400 is grand theft, which is a felony.

In any case, I don't care how much money is involved, it always sucks to get scammed. Good luck!

You should have gave it to me and let me invest it in crack for you.:2 cents:

What I don't understand is why'd you take that much risk just for a 3% greater return than you were currently making? You said you were gettin 5%, (which sounds very high for a cd) and he guaranteed you 8%. I could possibly see you getting sucked in if he promised a 15 - 25% return, but for 8%?

Damm ........

Sounds good, how do we start?

First of all sorry to hear. It sucks when you lose your hard earned money especially at the hands of a scammer.

He said it was "stocks, forex" etc... but that he would guarantee you a 10% return ? Red flags should have gone off right there. No one can guarantee you any return muchless 10% when it comes to the stock market / commodities / futures etc...

If you want look for a very secure high return, check out the property tax sales, if your state has them, most do. In my state you are guaranteed a 17% return on your money in your first year and 12% each year after that. After 3 years you can take ownership of the property. The specifics vary from state to state.

Its a $750 to $1250 difference at the end of the year. yeah, its not a ton of money but enough for a weekend vacation or something.

plus, I had the funds in a liquid CD with BofA that they could change the rate at anytime.

the reason I got suckered in was because he was a good friend of a friend, so I trusted him. The guarantee was a great catch too. He told me whatever he gets about 10% he gets 50% and i get the other 50%.

before his partner got him to invest in a ponzi scheme, he was making really good money off stocks, investments and forex, but got greedy and saw an easy way to make money without working

dont forget to claim the loss on your taxes

exaclty, you trusted your good friend. Your good friend trusted his good friend, who was the scammer. Everyone trusted everyone and no one did homework.

Fuck the stockmarket, forex, all that shit. I would never touch those things with my money. The only way you will ever make money is if you get insider information. Which very few people will ever get access to that kind of info. You will have "big shots" come in here and say how they made millions in the stock market, but they wont tell you how much they lost. Its like the people who gamble and brag when they won 10K but they never mention all the other weeks/games that the lost money and they are down. The bookie always wins, the brokerage house always wins, the casino always wins, the players hardly ever win. And for everyone person who really does make money from the stockmarket you will find a 1000 more that loses money. This is for day trading type investing which sounds like your situation. If you lock up your money for retirement purposes, 30-40+ years and its in the market you will do fine as the market has historically always gone up over large periods of time. It's the buy/sell, buy/sell that you will end up broke. That is if the guy you gave the money to doesn't steal first before you even have a chance to lose it all. :disgust:(

depending on your tax bracket, you can get back about 1/3 of your losses in tax breaks but i believe there is a max of 2K or 3K a year you can use, so he will have to carry the loss for a while. At least it is something.

If this guy had a legitimate business (meaning that he was licensed to make investments for others and manage funds) your re-course is getting a lawyer and filing a claim with the SEC.

http://www.sec.gov/investor/pubs/howoiea.htm

that is bad :(

sad sad story, hope you will at least get some money back.

lawyer time