A Grand Jury has indicted Profit Connect founder Brent Carson Kovar.

Kovar, a Nevada resident, was indicted on February 12th and arrested on February 13th.

Profit Connect was an MLM crypto Ponzi launched in 2020. The scam was originally co-founded by Eddie Kona and Kovar, however Kona died in May or June 2021.

A month or so later the SEC filed civil fraud charges, alleging Profit Connect was a $12 million Ponzi scheme.

Kovar’s nine-page indictment charges him with twelve counts of wire fraud, three counts of mail fraud and three counts of money laundering.

From Kovar’s indictment;

In general, the defendant falsely represented that Profit Connect was a profitable, up-and-running company that mined cryptocurrency and verified cryptocurrency transactions, paid investors a fixed rate of return of 15%-30% APR, and provided a 100% money-back guarantee.

In reality, as the defendant then and there well knew, Profit Connect

  1. was not a profitable, up-and-running company,
  2. did not and could not pay fixed rates of return to investors, and
  3. had no legitimate means to back its 100% money-back guarantee.

Moreover, instead of using investor money as promised, the defendant used investor money to, among other things, operate Profit Connect, buy gifts for employees, buy a house for himself, and repay investors as if those repayments came from mining cryptocurrency and verifying cryptocurrency transactions.

In total, the defendant obtained approximately $24 million from at least 400 investors.

At his February 13th arraignment, Kovar pled not guilty to all eighteen charges. Kovar was released on a personal recognizance bond at his arraignment.

Given Kovar has already settled civil Profit Connect fraud charges with the SEC, I think it’s pretty obvious we’ll see a guilty plea at some point.

If he doesn’t plead guilty and proceeds to trial, Kovar, 58, faces a maximum penalty of 330 years in prison and $4.5 million fine.

Kovar’s Profit Connect trial has been scheduled for April 8th, 2025.