uFun Club to ditch Malaysia for Samoa?
Following the announcement yesterday that Daniel Tay, uFun Club’s Marketing Director, was going into hiding, we speculated on where he might flee to.
At first glance Vanuatu emerged as a likely candidate, given it’s increasingly looking like uFun Club has laundered millions of dollars through the country’s UDBP Bank.
Now new information has emerged, suggesting the pacific nation of Samoa might also be a contender.
Our source for this story is Nicolas Giannos (right), a UK-based uFun Club investor who claims uFun Club’s uToken scheme ‘is by far the best opportunity that I’ve seen in my life‘.
After attending the Gateway Klang gala in Malaysia towards the end of April, Giannos then took a trip to Samoa in early May.
On the 4th of May, Giannos had ‘a successful meeting with the deputy prime minister of Samoa‘, who Giannos claims expressed ‘major interest in Utoken and Ufun group‘:
Wrote one commentator on one of Giannos’ Samoa updates;
I really have to get British Passport.. i missed this special business trip and holiday.
On the 6th of May, Giannos then claims to have had a ‘meeting with the central bank of Samoa‘:
According to the Central Bank of Samoa’s website, they are
the nation’s reserve bank and, as such, act as banker to the Government and the commercial banks.
Giannos’ meeting with the bank was followed up by a dinner with the Samoan deputy-prime minister on May 14th:
That same day, Giannos purportedly met with Samoan Prime Minister, Tuilaepa Aiono Sailele Malielegaoi:
The purpose of the meeting?
To make a presentation to “introduce” uFun Club and uToken to Prime Minister Malielegaoi:
The day after on the 15th of May (last Friday), Giannos then made a similar presentation to the Governor of the Central Bank of Samoa:
On whose authority Giannos is making these presentations is unclear. Ditto the explicit nature of talks between Giannos, Prime Minister Malielegaoi and the Central Bank of Samoa.
What we do know is that on May 11th, fellow uFun investor Lyn Summers posted the following on Facebook:
I had a meeting with Dato Danial today (but) the secret content of that meeting I cannot share just yet.
I have seen the video of the next project which I was told the video alone cost $100kUSD to produce.
The project is one of the biggest in that country. It will blow you away as it did me when it’s ready to be announced!
I had to sign a non disclosure agreement not to reveal any of the secrets of the next project.
Summers claims to have invested $500,000 in uFun Club and regularly shares Giannos’ updates on her Facebook timeline (he does the same with hers).
On May 15th, while Giannos was presenting uFun Club to the Governor of the Central Bank of Samoa, police raided a UDBP Bank branch in Thailand.
uFun Club and UDBP Bank signed an agreement in 2014, with the scheme believed to have used the Vanuatuan bank to launder millions of dollars out of Thailand through Vanuatu and Malaysia.
Yesterday Casey Tan, another prominent uFun investor, issued the following statement on behalf of uFun Club management:
A new township being developed in a Third World Country… I cannot revealed the country for now but we have seen the $100,000 to produced video of this Gigantic project… we will be there at the MOA of this project and will be rubbing shoulders with the Prime Minister and Generals on stage..
Tan also revealed that Daniel Tay, the face of uFun Club for many investors, didn’t ‘want to be remembered as a Ponzi Pimp or a scammer‘ and would have to “disappear from the surface of this earth”.
Is uFun Club looking to abandon Malaysia and establish a base of operations in Samoa? Nicolas Giannos’ Facebook updates, coinciding with Lyn Summers and Casey Tan’s posts certainly seem to suggest so.
Daniel Tay had to have known it was only a matter of time before Thai police knocked on UDBP Bank’s door.
Now with two UDBP executives and three staff under arrest and a mountain of evidence seized, it won’t be long before police have a detailed roadmap of exactly how and where uFun Club laundered its Ponzi proceeds to.
I wouldn’t at all be surprised if later this week it’s revealed Tay has fled Malaysia, if he hasn’t already, only to turn up in Samoa at some point in the future.
Meanwhile for those unfamiliar with the pacific nation, Samoa has a population of just under 200,000 people (2012) and an estimated GDP of $955 million USD (2014).
Needless to say a global $1.17 billion Ponzi scheme integrating itself into the local economy and central bank infrastructure would be devastating once uFun Club collapses.
Can authorities in Thailand, China, Vanuatu and Malaysia stop Daniel Tay in time and prevent uFun club from wreaking catastrophic economic destruction across the pacific?
Stay tuned…
Update 4th of June 2015 – On May 26th Samoan police arrested Nicolas Giannos for scamming locals out of over $100,000.
At the time of publication, Giannos remains in custody pending the outcome of a regulatory investigation.
Alright guys, I’m mentally exhausted but I think we’re now fully up to date on uFun Club going into the new week.
I think that’s it for today.
samoa!
this is scintillating stuff.
a top affiliate, giannos, scrambling half way across the world, in samoa, in a bid to keep the ponzi alive!
does samoa have internet? i hope they google ‘ufun’.
ufun has created quite a dramatic story, with powerful politicians, royalty, big corporate, miss malaysia’s and international ponzi advisers and aides, like giannos and lynn summers. it’s not just plain ol’ boring ponzi, it’s Ponzi Scandal!!
unfortunately for danial tay, no amount of dissapearing from the face of the earth, will dilute his ‘ponzi pimp’ status. just like ‘dato’, this ‘honorific’ will always be attached to his name.
samoa is no stranger to laundering ponzi funds:
sounds totally familiar, you can just juxtapose the above on the situation between ufun/UDBP or ufun/samoa/giannos, in the present.
nicolas giannos’ facebook posts often say ‘with Rosita Stanfield’.
it follows that rosita stanfield is either his girlfriend or wife.
rosita stanfield has a sister named perenise puna Who Is A Resident Of Samoa.
this is what perenise puna’s FB page says 3 hrs ago:
faleolo airport is in samoa of course.
so, it seems giannos will be spending more time there, getting samoa’s cooperation for ufun banking [laundering], since his wife/girlfriend is headed there too.
this is what rosita posted on FB on may 7th:
so rosita stanfield was in samoa and then left, and now is headed back there again.
giannos’ efforts with the samoan prime minister and the banks must be paying, for the couple to spend so much time there?
$100,000 to produce a video? SURE way to embezzle 100k out of the company, pay your friend and a camera 100k then he splits it with you. what a joke.
WHO on earth would be proud of their ponzi spending 100k on a video? Man all Ponzi players should know their organisation should ONLY spend money to increase the marketing of the ponzi, ssure videos are great but not for 100k what a joke
if you gonna promote a ponzi at least pick one that makes sense this ufun is ridiculous beyond belief.
All the MAPS leaders got involved in this behind Casey Tan. Im lucky i didnt get involved and just stick to MAPS!
One ponzi is enough for me hehehehehehe although Mike Deese Hillybilly is spending his fresh earn ponzi money on new car with big wheels (all Hill billy spend dirty money on new truck).
out of all the international tax havens, samoa is credited as being the ‘most secretive’.
dozens of tax havens including switzerland, anguilla, uruguay, belize,hong kong, singapore, duabi, monaco etc which are the destination for undeclared money, are going to open up their books to foreign tax in the coming years, and shed their ‘secrecy’.
this increases the market share for samoa, which is becoming popular as a tax haven, because :
– It is ranked No.1 as the world’s most Secretive State.
– samoa has political stability.
– their prime minister, Tuilaepa, recently announced: “For small economies with narrow revenue bases, Government leaders must always remain vigilant to use every opportunity available to them to raise revenue for development,”
guess giannos has headed to samoa for a reason!
searches for perenise puna in samoa, throw up a perenise tinei puna who is:
i cannot verify that ‘perenise puna’ is the same person as ‘perenise tunei puna’, but searches aren’t throwing up anything else. i’m inviting readers, to find out more if they can.
if pernise puna is indeed the same as perenise tunei puna, then her work profile as “Assistant Chief Executive Offir (Corporate Division) in the Revenue Ministry”, is the ‘exact profile’ that would help giannos get his appointments and attention, from the samoan PM to the central bank.
i mean, granted samoa is a little country, BUT for an unknown foreigner to arrive there, and straightways get wined and dined by the top samoan authorities, can happen only with the help of ‘contacts’.
According to Facebook update, as dug up by JusticeAlwaysLate, UFUN’s Malaysian side accountant is FBupdating that she’s taking a trip to London. Hmmmm…
NOLINK://www.facebook.com/JusticeAlwaysLate/photos/p.438093319702877/438093319702877/?type=1&theater
Latest from Thailand… Chinese Embassy has dispatched special liaison attache to cooperate with Thai police to shut down UFUN, according to a 3 hour press conference in Thailand.
nationmultimedia.com/national/Chinese-officials-to-join-forces-with-Thai-police–30260341.html
Then that argument has been busted too. There never was and never intended to be any “Reserve Fund” to back up the value of Utokens.
Not any initial $10 million deposit, not any 22% reserve from investments and transactions.
And I can see UBDP’s defense write itself: we’re as much victim of UFUN as everybody else.
IMHO though, there’s no way the top level execs not know what’s going on. Proving it, however, is a different matter.
I’d suspect Thai police to lean on the two in custody and have them rat out Tay and the rest, but hopefully save face for the PM of Malaysia and his “poor” kid, as sort of “wink-nudge” acknowledgement that they need to start cracking down as you can only hold a flame in a paperbag for so long.
Great article. I’m from Samoa and been following this story with interest.
Just an update on this issue you can read here:
samoaobserver.ws/local-news/52-crime/13679-police-detain-alleged-pyramid-scammers
Thanks.
Thanks for the heads up KLui! I was beginning to wonder what became of Giannos…
Dude got arrested, mystery solved!
That one was good. 🙂
1. First one not so large “test transaction”.
2. Then a failed $100,000 transaction.
3. And then being arrested and having accounts frozen.
That sounded exactly like Ufun. 🙂
Giannos may have acted on his own initiative. He’s not among the original Ufun leaders, he’s one of many “alternative leaders” or “local organizers” who have popped up in the last month.
April 10, Thailand:
Ufun Club was shut down in Thailand. The main part of the story is still going on in Thailand. Several local leaders were arrested and assets were frozen.
3 Malaysian leaders (Tay Kim Leng, 40; Lee Kuan Ming, 38; Wong Ching Hua) had already escaped to Malaysia. Please note that those Chinese names can have different spelling in different countries.
May 16, Malaysia:
We and other sources made some noise about Ufun’s connection to Malaysia PM’s son through the company Sagajuta (Sabah) Sdn Bhd. Malaysian Ufun leader Dato’ Daniel Tay (Tay Kim Leng, 40) had to go into hiding rather immediately because of that.
Giannis / other “alternative leaders”
Those “alternative leaders” popped up after that. They are not part of the original management team as far as we know. Some of them may have been brought in to prevent the scheme from collapsing completely.
Giannis may have been brought in to find alternative solutions in Samoa, whatever that might be. I don’t believe his primary focus was to organize a local pyramid scheme in Samoa, he was more likely looking for a tax heaven for Ufun (a new place to organize the scheme FROM).
Update:
talamua.com/trio-charged-in-cyber-crime-money-scam-to-appear-in-court/
Giannos has probably faked most of those “endorsements” by putting up various “group photos” of himself and some other people.
Those “other people” can be anyone who looks believable enough to be accepted (e.g. the photo of a dinner with 5 other people may look like some type of “official meeting” with some “Samoan Deputy Prime Minister”). 🙂
As long as he doesn’t specifically name the people in the photo, the story may be believable enough.
If someone tries to google “deputy prime minister Samoa” then Giannos can retreat to the position “That photo shows a meeting with people from his office, where we discussed some details”.
No, those are real photos of the PM and Deputy PM and others.
The people in the photo are real, but that is not Samoa’s deputy prime minister, he is a Cabinet Minister for the Ministry of Communication, Information and Technology.
The lady in green is his wife and the lady in orange is Rosita’s sister perenise who works at the Ministry of Inland revenue.
The other photo is with Samoa’s prime minister and also the Central Bank of Samoa Governor,
interesting case this is. The so called ‘deputy prime minister’ however is NOT the dep PM but was the Acting PM at the time.
Interesting though that he would endorse this scheme without any proper research into the background of UFun AND the Giannos individual. He is the Minister for Communications and Info Tech.
Those are indeed the Min for MCIT as well as his wife etc.
They resumed the case yesterday and the Samoa Central Bank lawyer takes the stand today to give evidence.
This is crazy. Nicolas Giannos is luckily still in Samoa (the authorities must still have his passport) and on trial this week.
He is having the time of his life and looks pretty carefree- meets up with people all the time, takes part in some fun runs, goes to the beach etc.
I gather he’s a bit of a traveler so is probably making the most of his situation.
Not like he’s going to flee the island sans passport so no point keeping him locked up. They’ve also probably got support through Stanfield’s family too.