Following an almost two year wait, earlier today a decision on Charles Scoville’s Traffic Monsoon Ponzi appeal was published.

In a decision that positively nobody could have predicted, the Tenth Circuit appeals court has denied the Traffic Monsoon appeal. [Continue reading…]

Despite having a whole section dedicated to transparency, Pro Mine Technologies fails to disclose company ownership details on its website.

A marketing document provided on the Power Mine Technologies website however identifies Aidan Parr as owner and Director of the company.

Parr is from the UK, which corresponds with Pro Mine Technologies LTD’s UK incorporation in November 2018.

Beyond providing an official looking certificate to parade about on Facebook however, Pro Mine Technologies’ UK incorporation is meaningless.

UK incorporation is dirt cheap and for the most part unregulated. It is a favorite for scammers looking to incorporate dodgy companies.

On his personal Facebook profile, Parr (right) also cites himself as a Director of Revive Landscapes.

After getting his landscape business ‘in a place (he) had longed for‘, Parr claims he ‘turned to the online space of crypto currencies‘.

Prior to launching Power Mine Technologies Parr was promoting the Berlin Group Recycle Bot and iCenter Ponzi schemes.

Read on for a full review of the Pro Mine Technologies MLM opportunity. [Continue reading…]

A court transcript has provided the clearest picture of the ongoing international investigation into OneCoin yet. [Continue reading…]

iThrive Network provides no information on their website about who owns or runs the business.

The iThrive Network website domain (“ithrivenetwork.net”) was privately registered on June 4th, 2018.

From what I can gather iThrive Network is a reboot of the collapsed iPro Network scheme.

iPro Network launched in early 2017 and was attached to the ProCurrency altcoin (PROC).

iPro Network offloaded pre-generated PROC onto its affiliates, on the usual promises of riches.

On the MLM side of things, iPro Network paid commissions on recruitment of new affiliate investors.

In true MLM altcoin fashion PROC pumped upon its initial listing in late April 2017. PROC peaked at an all time high of 35 cents toward mid July.

This was followed by a sharp decline beginning August, with PROC currently trading at .06 cents (that’s 0.06 actual cents, not 6 cents).

By mid 2018 iPro Network itself had collapsed. In a desperate bid to keep the company going the association was PROC was abandoned (typical MLM altcoin exit-scam).

It was around this time that iThrive Network was announced.

Note that although iPro Network has been abandoned, for some reason the company’s website is still up.

In our March 2017 iPro Network review we noted Armando Contreras cited as CEO of the company.

Based on the lack of verifiable information provided on Contreras, we weren’t sure he actually existed.

We’re still not sure and iThrive Network’s website being devoid of executive information doesn’t inspire confidence.

A video titled “iThrive Launch Update 7-28-2018” was uploaded to the official iPro Network Vimeo channel on July 30th, 2018.

In the video Daniel Pacheco (right) is identified as “the president of the company”.

On his personal Facebook profile, Pacheco identifies himself as “President (organization) at iProNetwork”.

Pacheco appears to have been involved with iPro Network either from launch or from very early on.

Prior to iPro Network and iThrive Network, Pacheco was promoting the Lucrazon Global Ponzi scheme:

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…]

The BitinForex website provides no information about who owns or runs the business.

The BitinForex website domain (“bitinforex.com”) was privately registered on December 17th, 2018.

Through its business model (see compensation plan section below), BitinForex is inextricably linked to Top10Cap and CoinFinexx.

Top10Cap and CoinFinexx have their own websites, neither of which provides management or ownership information.

The Top10Cap and CoinFinexx website domains were privately registered on March 6th and December 3rd, 2018 respectively.

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…]

Tycoon69 bills itself as “the ICO network” and operates in the MLM cryptocurrency niche.

A corporate address for “Tycoon69” Switzerland is provided in the footer of the Tycoon69 website. The website however provides no information about who owns or runs the company.

That said, someone with possibly the worst possible haircut for an older gentleman I’ve ever seen features prominently in Tycoon69’s marketing videos.

Captain Bad Hair features in some other Tycoon69 marketing videos and I eventually identified him as Stefan Hostettler.

If Hostettler is an owner of Tycoon69 then he is a silent one. Beyond fronting Tycoon69’s marketing efforts, it is unclear whether Hostletter has an executive role within the company.

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…]

Faith Sloan, the last remaining TelexFree defendant, was scheduled to face trial on February 11th.

The SEC allege Sloan stole over a million dollars from TelexFree victims.

Unfortunately due to Donald Trump’s ongoing government shutdown, Sloan’s trial has now been delayed until the end of March. [Continue reading…]

Tryp provides no information on their website about who owns or runs the business.

The Tryp website domain (“tryprides.com”) was registered on July 12th, 2018.

The domain is owned by Robert McNulty, through a virtual office address in the US state of Nevada.

Further research reveals Tryp marketing material and affiliates citing McNulty as CEO of the company.

Why this information is not provided on the Tryp website is unclear.

McNulty has a history in e-commerce, most notably as founder, President and CEO of Shopping.com.

What you won’t find in Tryp marketing material however is McNulty’s tenure as Shopping.com CEO was marred by a market manipulation investigation by the SEC.

Later that year McNulty resigned, although he was hired back two weeks later as a “consultant” (nothing suss).

Shopping.com was sold off to Compaq a year later in 1999.

One thing I’ll note is the Wikipedia page for “shopping.com”, which states the site was ‘founded in Israel in 1998 by Dr. Nahum Sharfman and Amir Ashkenazi‘.

Robert McNulty’s name does not appear in the entry, so I’m not sure what’s going on there.

Update 20th January 2019 – Some insight from BehindMLM reader K. Chang that seems to fit;

McNulty founded Shopping.com back in 1996, stepped down by 1998. Shopping.com eventually was sold off to Compaq who owned AltaVista at the time.

Elsewhere in Israel, Sharfman and Ashkenanzi founded Papricom, dba DealTime.com in 1998. They bought the shopping.com domain in 2003 from Alta Vista and rebranded itself shopping.com and was eventually bought by eBay in 2005.

/end update

Five years prior to “founding” Shopping.com, McNulty was investigated by the SEC for, among other things, anti-fraud and securities law violations.

In a complaint filed by the Commission on September 30, 1994, McNulty was charged with orchestrating a complex scheme to defraud investors by using the proceeds of securities offerings by HQOS, HQOI, Auto Giant and Auto Depot to finance the operations of affiliated companies and the companies’ underwriter and market maker, Global America, Inc., rather than for the stated purpose of funding the issuers’ operations.

McNulty settled the charges in October 1995.

In late 2009 McNulty launched, Kaching Kaching, an e-commerce niche MLM company.

As of late 2010 the company was still operational but appears to have shut down sometime thereafter.

On his personal website McNulty has a section titled “What I’m doing now”;

My latest dedicated journey is a new company I’ve created (ibuy,inc [sic] / ibuyrite) that will enable independent small brick and mortar retail businesses to not only compete, but to thrive in this brave new world of eCommerce online retail.

At the time of publication the Ibuyrite website has an Alexa traffic ranking of 11.3 million, which is as good as dead.

In early 2018 McNulty co-founded SupplyBloc, in which he also held the position of CEO.

According to the SupplyBloc website, it

was founded with the mission of solving the greatest problems that businesses face in global commerce and e-commerce, namely those involved with supply-chain management.

Our solution rests on a foundation of deeply complex blockchain technology.

SupplyBloc initially planned to sell its SUPX ICO for $1 a coin.

In May 2018 SupplyBloc “temporarily paused” its pre-ICO, amid concerns the company might potentially be committing securities fraud.

As of January 2019 SUPX has failed to materialize.

Read on for a full review of the Tryp MLM opportunity. [Continue reading…]

Kingdom Wealth Alliance provides no information on its website about who owns or runs the business.

The Kingdom Wealth Alliance website domain (“kwamembership.com”) was privately registered on September 16th, 2018.

Two other domains used by Kingdom Wealth Alliance, “kingdomwealthalliance.org” and “kwaaffiliate.com”, were also privately registered last year.

In the comments at the footer of the “kwamembership” website, Stan Harris is referenced as having something to do with the company.

Dr. Stan Harris a.k.a. Dr. Breakthrough and his KWA Team of experts have a proven track record of discipline, diligence, and integrity.

Upon clicking on either the “privacy policy”, “terms and conditions” or “earnings disclaimer” links at the footer of the “kwamembership” website, I was redirected to a Power Lead System splash page.

BehindMLM reviewed Power Lead System in 2013. The recruitment-focused opportunity is owned by Michael Price.

Marketing videos on the Kingdom Wealth Alliance website are hosted on a YouTube channel in the company’s name.

The same channel features religiously themed videos hosted by Chris Leeper:

Tying all of this together is another unlisted video titled “Introducing KWA (Micheal Price [sic], Dr Stan Harris & Chris Leeper)”:

In the video Price explains;

[2:50] Kingdom Wealth Alliance is an alliance of experts … that are gonna teach people how to be financially wealthy.

We’re gonna start there just because that’s what most people are focused on.

But a lot of people are going to find out very quickly that Jesus talked more … about finances then he did about salvation.

Why? Well you’re gonna find that out through Kingdom Wealth Alliance.

Stan Harris is a serial scammer, perhaps best known as a top investor in the OneCoin Ponzi scheme.

Although he doesn’t reference the company by name, Harris boasts about how many people he scammed in the comments of the KWA Membership website;

By the grace of God I was the #1 recruiter and #1 income earner in 3 Companies simultaneously!

One company had 2.2 million members in it and 1.5 Million were on my team!

After OneCoin collapsed in January 2017 Harris stopped promoting it, leaving the 1.5 million investors under him in the lurch.

Prior to OneCoin Harris was promoting National Wealth Center, a Peter Wolfing cash gifting scam.

If Chris Leeper has an MLM history he’s kept it low-key. I suspect he’s found his way into Kingdom Wealth Alliance on the back of Price, Harris or both.

Read on for a full review of the Kingdom Wealth Alliance MLM opportunity. [Continue reading…]

Options Rider was a Ponzi scheme launched all the way back in early 2015.

The scam was supposedly headed up by “Bob Roberts”.

To the best of my knowledge though nobody ever actually had any verifiable contact with Roberts.

Roberts was also tied to BancdeOptions, a company used to launder invested Options Rider funds.

By late 2015 Options Rider had collapsed. Bob Roberts was killed off in early 2016 and the scammers behind Options Rider disappeared.

Options Rider operated through bank accounts in Australia.

Despite Options Rider being a fraudulent company, in mid 2015 a liquidator was appointed. At some point the Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC) also got involved. [Continue reading…]