You were sued by the SEC for securities fraud in 2021. You just recently found the SEC is investigating you again for securities fraud.

Your Ponzi scheme has collapsed, you found out your partners in crime secretly used your company to launder millions for another Ponzi scheme, and you’re also in the middle of a lawsuit with said partners in crime.

What do you do?

Well… if you’re Oscar Garcia, you sign a payment processor contract with yet another Ponzi scheme. [Continue reading…]

NextGen, the thrice collapsed Ponzi scheme, held a marketing event in Cyprus between March 10th and 12th.

At the event My Car Club was revealed as NextGen’s new marketing funnel.

As NextGen’s Managing Director Paul Chalmers explained; [Continue reading…]

Billions Trade Club fails to provide ownership or executive information on its website.

Billions Trade Club’s website domain (“billionstradeclub.com”), was first registered in November 2021. The private registration was last updated on October 9th, 2022.

Prelaunch videos were uploaded to Billions Trade Club’s YouTube channel in July 2022. The company launched shortly thereafter.

While it doesn’t provide any specific information, Billions Trade Club does provide a photo of what it claims are “strategic management”:

Through additional research I’ve added Billions Trade Club’s management names in the caption above.

Other than him being a random crypto bro running something called “HamdenCorp”, I wasn’t able to get a reading on Shakin Hamden prior to Billions Trade Club.

Jorge Rodriguez was the Commercial Director of Smart Business Corp.

Daniel Ortiz and Ivan Velez were Smart Business Corp promoters.

Smart Business Corp is an Mexican MLM crypto Ponzi scheme. BehindMLM reviewed Smart Business Corp in May 2022, following its transition to cryptocurrency (which Rodriguez, Ortiz and Velez were very much part of).

SimilarWeb tracked just 13,000 visits to Smart Business Corp’s website as of February 2023. For an MLM Ponzi scheme, that’s as good as dead.

If I had to guess, the writing was already on the wall for Smart Business Corp in early 2022. This prompted Rodriguez, Ortiz and Velez to abandon ship and launch Billions Trade Club.

Billions Trade Club operates through Quantum Leap Company LLC, a shell company purportedly incorporated in St. Vincent and the Grenadines.

St. Vincent and the Grenadines is a scam-friendly jurisdiction with no known active enforcement of MLM related fraud.

As opposed to St. Vincent and the Grenadines, Billions Trade Corp is operated from Mexico. The company is primarily being pitched in Mexico and the Americas.

SimilarWeb currently ranks top sources of traffic to Billions Trade Club as Mexico (62%), Colombia (12%), the US (11%) and Brazil (11%). [Continue reading…]

The Financial Supervision Authority of Norway (Finanstilsynet), has issued an investment fraud warning against Be.

As per Finanstilsynet’s March 23rd warning; [Continue reading…]

An ongoing legal dispute between Ponzi scammers Armen Temurian and Phillip Piccolo has been settled.

As per a March 24th filing; [Continue reading…]

Premier Financial Alliance has reached a settlement in a pending class-action filed against it. [Continue reading…]

Maxpread Technologies has received a pyramid fraud warning from Russia.

As per the Central Bank of Russia’s March 24th warning, Maxpread Technologies shows “signs of a financial pyramid” scheme. [Continue reading…]

Generation Zoe scammers in Florida have been hit with an $847,159 judgment.

The judgment was issued earlier this month by a state-level Dade County Court.

Following collapse of the Generation Zoe Ponzi in early 2022, sixteen plaintiff victims from Florida, Spain, Chile and Colombia filed a case against their recruiters.

Named defendants in the civil suit were Zoe Global University and Florida-based individuals Pablo, Matias and Agustin Monteleone. [Continue reading…]

QZ Asset Management is using NASDAQ as a marketing tool.

The Hong Kong based Ponzi scheme also claims it has raised $100 million from the private selling of shares. [Continue reading…]

LedgerBlock operates in the MLM cryptocurrency niche.

LedgerBlock operates from the domain “ledgerblock.net”, privately registered on January 13th, 2023.

On January 12th, LedgerBlock uploaded an “International Key Leader’s Summit” promo to its official YouTube channel.

The individuals above identify themselves as “Romeo and Amanda”.

If LedgerBlock posting a leader’s summit video before its website domain was registered strikes you as odd, that’s because it is.

Note the “HyperLedger” logo in the top right of the above video. I believe LedgerBlock might have previously launched under this name.

LedgerBlock’s YouTube channel was created in October 2022, so HyperLedger’s launch would have been brief before switching over to LedgerBlock.

Whatever the story is, LedgerBlock appears to have held a marketing event in Malaysia on or around January 15th, 2023.

At the event LedgerBlock revealed CEO “Andrew James”:

Naturally James doesn’t exist outside of LedgerBlock’s marketing. That’s because he’s an actor, played by UK national and Malaysian resident Paul Sykes.

When he’s not moonlighting as a Boris CEO, Sykes runs his consultancy firm Humateca.

From Humateca’s website;

We partner with blochain [sic] businesses, one of our key strategic partners is Blockworq.io, a Malaysian based Blockchain solutions provider.

Sykes is also Blockworq’s Chief Marketing Officer (click to enlarge):

From what I’ve been able to piece together, Sykes transitioned from legitimate business interests to cryptocurrency in 2021.

Sykes’ Blockworq executive role came before Humateca, which was founded on or around September 2022.

What I’m not clear on is whether there’s any links between Blockworq and LedgerBlock.

What is clear is Paul Sykes is a Boris CEO playing Andrew James.

Executive co-conspirators on LedgerBlock’s website include Adam Lester and Dato Asmawey Bin Hussain.

Ironically, Hussain is cited as President of Crime Prevention & Awareness Board of Malaysia.

Be it these charlatans or someone else, whoever is running LedgerBlock is obviously based out of Malaysia.

Dubai, the MLM crime capital of the world, is another possibility:

Promoters are running around claiming LedgerBlock is holding an event in Dubai in May. At the event LedgerBlock will launch an “avatar” shitcoin and in-house crypto exchange.

On the corporate side of things, LedgerBlock cites itself as “SMB LedgerBlock China Group”:

Oh and just in case Paul Sykes tries to pull the ol’ “they stole my photo!” ruse, here he is playing Andrew James in-person at LedgerBlock’s January 2023 marketing event:

As of February 2023, SimilarWeb ranks top sources of traffic to LedgerBlock’s website as Indonesia (47%), Malaysia (21%, down 61% month on month), Sri Lanka (20%), Brazil (8%) and the UAE (3%).

As always, if an MLM company is not openly upfront about who is running or owns it, think long and hard about joining and/or handing over any money. [Continue reading…]