US authorities have taken down the “Mike G Deal”.

The DOJ and SEC allege $45 million in fraud, and ringleader Neil Suresh Chandran has been arrested.

On January 4th, the SEC filed a Complaint naming Chandran, Garry Davidson, Michael Glaspie, Linda Knott, Amy Mossel (Glaspie’s wife), Banner Co-Op Inc., BannersGo LLC and AEO Publishing Inc. as defendants.

The SEC’s federal Mike G Deal lawsuit was preceded by state-level cease and desists from Michigan and Alabama.

These enforcement actions resulted in Glaspie and Knott paying $15,000 and $10,000 fines respectively.

If you’re unfamiliar with the Mike G Deal, the basic premise is that victims are strung along on a never-ending series of promises and missed deadlines.

The promises and deadlines pertain to a deal, which of course never eventuates.

While the deal itself and fictitious story surrounding it changes, the MO remains the same: investors are lured in on the promise of “getting in early” to capitalize on the deal before its executed.

For the most part Michael Glaspie (right) was the face and voice of the deal. This led to the scam being known as the “Mike G Deal”.

I want to note that while the Mike G Deal itself isn’t MLM, Glaspie has used it to funnel victims into MLM ventures.

Because of Glaspie’s ties to MLM, I’ve made the editorial decision to cover the SEC’s and DOJ’s Mike G Deal enforcement actions.

BehindMLM first came across Glaspie in 2016 through Icanget2. This became The ICANetwork in 2017.

In June 2022 we came across Glaspie again, funneling Mike G Deal victims into the Win on Wealth Ponzi scheme.

The Mike G Deal iteration the SEC has gone with is “CoinDeal”.

Chandran, a recidivist securities law violator and convicted felon, claimed to own a unique blockchain technology that was on the verge of being sold for trillions of dollars to a group of reputable billionaire buyers (“CoinDeal”).

Chandran further claimed his business required interim financial support until the sale transaction closed. Together with and through other named Defendants, Chandran targeted mostly unsophisticated investors with false and misleading promises and representations that investments in CoinDeal would soon yield extremely high returns from the imminent sale of his business.

Chandran typically provided status updates on the supposed deal, including but not limited to: the involvement of foreign central banks and the United States Department of Homeland Security; the latest board meetings of the consortium of wealthy buyers; the role of certain political figures; and the causes of “temporary” delays to the sale closing.

These updates were designed to lull investors and induce them to continue investing in CoinDeal.

The SEC alleges that Chandran (right)  “incentivized” recruitment of investors into the deal.

This started in 2018 with Davidson (a then former victim of Chandran’s), who went on to recruit Glaspie.

Glaspie, an online promoter, raised large sums for CoinDeal from tens of thousands of investors in multiple states and countries.

As part of his promotional campaign, Glaspie knowingly or recklessly disseminated false information about CoinDeal that he received from Chandran via Davidson, including information concerning the supposed value and timeline of the sale transaction, as well as the purported involvement of prominent business people, financial institutions and governmental departments or agencies.

Glaspie regularly communicated such false information to investors through near-daily written updates and weekly teleconferences, in which Davidson occasionally participated.

In or around January 2019, Glaspie began promoting the CoinDeal opportunity during weekly teleconferences that included over 100,000 invitees from his network of contacts.

Glaspie explained that an unnamed Canadian resident had a very valuable (but anonymous) artificial intelligence and cryptocurrency company that was preparing for an imminent sale to a group of billionaire buyers.

Glaspie further explained that the Canadian resident was unable to obtain conventional financing due to prior legal issues.

Glaspie did not reveal that this unnamed individual was Chandran, and he also failed to disclose that this individual had a criminal history in the United States.

Glaspie made additional misrepresentations and engaged in other fraudulent conduct, including by: creating and publicizing astronomical payout scales that ranged from multi-million dollar returns for investments of $1,000 or less, to returns in excess of $50 billion for investments of $100,000; offering referral bonuses to entice investors to recruit others to participate in CoinDeal; and personally guaranteeing to refund investors with 7% interest should CoinDeal not come to fruition.

In reality;

CoinDeal was merely the most recent iteration of Chandran’s prior fraudulent schemes.

No such buyer group existed, there was no impending sale, and Chandran was incapable of producing the astronomical returns he promised.

CoinDeal … never existed and thus, by design, the deal never closed.

Here are some of the excuses used to lure Mike G Deal investors along over the years;

On February 22, 2019, Glaspie falsely claimed in an online post that CoinDeal’s closing had been delayed due to a vendor company declaring bankruptcy.

On April 16, 2019, Glaspie falsely claimed in an online post that closing of CoinDeal had been delayed because a South Korean bank involved in the deal required in-person signatures in Hawaii.

On May 7, 2019, Glaspie falsely claimed in an online post that CoinDeal’s closing was delayed because an engineer familiar with the company systems was sick.

On July 24, 2019, Glaspie falsely claimed in an online post that closing was somehow delayed due to an issue involving the number of smart
phones being supplied by a vendor.

And on and on it went…

As time went on some Mike G Deal investors took it upon themselves to investigate Glaspie and the deal.

This led to the public outing of Chandran being behind the deal, which, despite knowing was true, Glaspie publicly denied.

On or about August 19, 2021, a prospective CoinDeal investor shared a link containing information about Chandran’s 2018 criminal charges and asked Glaspie to “confirm that Neil Chandran is NOT the seller of this transaction.”

In response, Glaspie denied that Chandran was involved, admonished the individual for “spreading rumors,” and further stated: “Please make this the last email on this topic [as] I just don[’]t have time for this disrupting email.”

On or about September 3, 2021, Glaspie again denied Chandran’s involvement in CoinDeal to a prospective investor.

On this occasion, the concerned individual told Glaspie: “I have been doing some digging around the internet. Some people say that ‘Neil’ the owner, is actually convicted fraudster Neil Chandran. Please tell me that’s not true.”

The individual further described finding “red flags” when searching Chandran’s name on the internet.

In response, Glaspie stated: “[W]here these rumors start is a mystery to me. The owner is NOT the man u think he is.”

All in all the Mike G Deal scammers took in $45 million. The funds were laundered through shell companies for “personal use”.

  • Neil Chandran misappropriated $37 million. Chandran spent the money on “a fleet of luxury vehicles, various real estate properties in
    California and Nevada, and a boat”.
  • Michael Glaspie misappropriated $5.9 million. Glaspie spent the money insurance policies for himself and wife Amy Mossel, as well as “transfer(ing) millions to his associates to pay salaries and for other business ventures”.
  • Garry Davidson misappropriated $3 million. Davidson spent the money on a “mobile home and used investor funds for personal living expenses”.
  • Linda Knott (right) was a Mike G Deal promoter who managed a group of ~10,000 investors. Knott misappropriated at least $749,000, which she spent on “personal use and purposes unrelated to CoinDeal”.

The vast majority of CoinDeal investors have not received the return of their principal investment amounts, and no investors have received any promised profits on their investments.

Chandran, Glaspie, and Mossel declined to testify during the SEC’s investigation, invoking their Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination.

This brings us to the indictment of Chandran by a Grand Jury in Nebraska on June 14th, 2022.

Following his indictment, Chandran was arrested in California on June 14th.

Chandran has been charged with:

  • three counts of wire fraud; and
  • two counts of engaging in monetary transactions in property derived from specified unlawful activity

Chandran pled not guilty to the charges on August 15th. Having been deemed a flight risk, on September 14th Chandran was ordered to remain in custody pending trial.

Chandran’s indictment detailed “100 different assets”, including bank accounts, real estate, and luxury vehicles, including 39 Tesla vehicles which, as of June 2022, were in the process of being seized.

If convicted on all five counts, Chandran, 51, faces up to 80 years in prison.

Chandran’s criminal case is ongoing, with a Status Conference scheduled for March 2nd, 2023.

Glaspie and Davidson are referenced in Chandran’s indictment as “Individual 1″ and Individual 2” respectively. Whether there are pending criminal proceedings against Glaspie and Davidson remains unclear.

Getting back to the SEC’s civil case; The Mike G Deal being a passive investment opportunity constitutes a securities offering.

The SEC alleges;

The CoinDeal investments offered and sold by the Defendants were securities.

No registration statement was ever filed with the SEC or has ever been in effect with respect to any offers and sales of CoinDeal investments.

As a result of their conduct, Chandran, Davidson, Glaspie, Knott, Banner Co-Op, and BannersGo intentionally, knowingly, or recklessly committed securities fraud and offered and sold unregistered securities.

The Mike G Deal defendants have been charged with violations of the Securities and Exchange Act across seven counts.

The SEC is also seeking disgorgement, civil penalties, officer and director bars, permanent injunctions and conduct-based injunctions.

I’ve added both Chandran’s criminal case and the SEC’s Mike G Deal case to BehindMLM’s case calendar. We’ll keep you updated as both cases progress.

 

Update 25th February 2023 – Michael Glaspie has plead guilty to one conspiracy to commit wire fraud charge.

Glaspie is scheduled to be sentenced in June.

 

Update 21st May 2023 – A third individual has been arrested in connection to the Mike G Deal.

Bryan Lee was the money guy behind the scheme. Lee was indicted under seal on May 15th and is believed to have been arrested a few days ago.

 

Update 3rd October 2023 – Michael Glaspie has been sentenced to six years in prison.