Although we knew various members of William Apsotelos’ family had plead guilty in relation to the Genesis Acqusitions Ponzi scheme, we didn’t really know much about their individual circumstances.

At a sentencing hearing on Wednesday, July 26th, it was revealed that William Apostelos’ sister and her daughter “were in fear” of Apostelos and his wife. [Continue reading…]

Michael Gehart joined Visalus in February, 2010.

Visalus is a weight loss MLM company founded in 2005 by Blake Mallen and Nick Sarnicola.

Gehart had no prior MLM experience when he signed up as a Visalus affiliate.

He was recruited by

Vito Torriciano, a part-owner of the company, (at a) meeting with Nick Sarnicola, and with a few other ViSalus distributors.

In addition to co-founding Visalus, Nick Sarnicola was an employee and top earner between 2010 and 2016.

This position purportedly saw Sarnicola sit atop ‘several massive “downlines” of distributors and customers‘.

Gehart (right) claims he joined Visalus on the representation

he could purchase ViSalus product at a so-called “wholesale” price for an opportunity to re-sell to others at a “retail” price.

In a lawsuit filed on June 29th, 2017, Gehart claims that was a lie and that Visualus operates as an “illegal pyramid scheme”. [Continue reading…]

Questra World are triggering regulatory alarm bells all across Europe, with the latest seeing the Bank of Slovakia issuing a warning. [Continue reading…]

As part of ongoing efforts to secure ill-gotten assets obtained by TelexFree co-owner Carlos Wanzeler, the DOJ sought to secure Boynton Beach and Coconut Creek properties in Florida.

The property in question is held in the name of Carlos Wanzeler’s brother Fabio and his wife Claudia. [Continue reading…]

As part of a filing pertaining to James Merrill’s restitution, the TelexFree Trustee has revealed

that the current estimate of the aggregate amount of allowed fraud victim claims is between $500 million and $700 million.

Unfortunately Merrill’s restitution order doesn’t name a specific amount, but rather consolidates his restitution with that of the Trustee’s efforts. [Continue reading…]

Despite the appearance of a grey area when it comes to MLM cryptocurrency companies and investment, I’ve maintained they’re still securities.

Be it Ponzi points like OneCoin or pump and dump altcoin scams, you’ve got affiliates investing real money on the promise or representation of a passive ROI; or in other words, the literal definition of a security.

Other than an enforcement action last month on a fraudulent bitcoin trading scheme, to date both the SEC and FTC have been quiet on regulation of the MLM cryptocurrency niche.

Following an investigative report into the “sales of digital assets by “virtual” organizations”, the SEC has concluded they are in fact securities offerings. [Continue reading…]

Crypto 7 Continents provide no information about who owns or runs the company on their website.

Marketing copy on the company’s “about us” section on their website appears to be copy and pasted from the Global Trading Club website:

Further analysis reveals the Crypto 7 Continents website to practically be a clone of Global Trading Club’s website.

Global Trading Club is a Ponzi scheme that launched in late 2016.

Global Trading Club affiliates invest $250 to $31,000 on the promise of a daily ROI for up to 475 days.

Reports of a collapse from Global Trading Club affiliates first surfaced in early May.

The Crypto 7 Continents website domain (“crypto7continents.com”) was privately registered on June 13th, 2017.

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…]

50 Cent Freedom provide no information on their website about who owns or runs the business.

The 50 Cent Freedom website domain (“50centfreedom.us”) was registered on July 10th, 2017. Sheri Vine is listed as the owner, with an address in Thailand also provided.

The admin email used to register the 50 Cent Freedom website uses the domain of “Horizon Homestay”.

Horizon Homestay offered rentable apartments in Malacca City, Malaysia.

The Facebook link on the Horizon Homestay website points to a Facebook profile by the name of “John Williams”.

John Williams claims to be from the UK but currently living in Malacca City itself.

MLM underbelly scams promoted by Williams date back to 2012 and include Our Matrix Club (pyramid recruitment), M2M Funds (cash gifting), Amazing5, (investment fraud), Quick Cycler (Ponzi scheme), Ultimate Bitcoin Builder (bitcoin cycler) and Global MoneyLine  (pyramid scheme).

The 50 Cent Freedom website uses nameservers hosted on the M2M Funds domain. This requires ownership of the M2M Funds domain to set.

Williams began promoting M2M Funds in early 2016. Following its collapse and his likely losing money in subsequent MLM underbelly scams, he’s now trying again with 50 Cent Freedom.

As far as I can tell Williams is based out of Malaysia. I did find a Sheri Vine promoting Horizon Homestay back in 2012;

However the relationship between Williams and Vine remains unclear.

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…]

On July 20th the Commissione Nazionale per le Società e la Borsa (CONSOB), Italy’s top financial regulator, issued a warning against Questra World and Atlantic Global Asset Management. [Continue reading…]

Hire a law firm to send out some extortion threats, tell your investors and sit back and watch them flood social media with claims websites all over the world are getting sued.

Turns out in the real world, a Ponzi scheme wishing to silence reporting of financial fraud is a little more complicated. [Continue reading…]