• In 2003, the SEC shut down a $1 lbillion scheme by Mutual Benefits Company in Florida, run by Peter Lombardi, affecting 28,000 investors. Mutual claimed it used the money to pay viatical settlements to HIV patients. Lombardi is now serving a 20-year prison sentence.^[44]
• In 2004, the SEC fined Raymond James $6.9 million for failure to supervise former broker Dennis Herula, who was accused of participating with others in a Ponzi scheme that raised about $44.5 million from investors in 1999–2000. Herula himself raised about $16.5 million of investor funds, most of which was later transferred to his wife's brokerage account at Raymond James; he was arrested in Bermuda and extradited to the United States where he pleaded guilty to fraud and was sentenced to 15 years and eight months' imprisonment.^[45]
• In February 2005, Moshe Leichner and his son Zvi^[46] were sentenced to 20 years in federal prison for running a Ponzi scheme^[47][48] that defrauded hundreds of investors out of more than $95 million,^[49] of GunnAllen Financial^[50] (shut down by regulators in March 2010 for fraud allegations and losses related to another Ponzi scheme^[51]) and Safe Harbor Capital Management (now dba HarborLight Capital Management)^[52] which lost $40 million^[53] for their investors.
• In May 2006, James Paul Lewis, Jr. was sentenced to 30 years in federal prison for running a $311 million Ponzi scheme over a 20-year period. He operated under the name Financial Advisory Consultants from Lake Forest, California.^[54]
• In 2007, a million Chinese lost over $1.2 billion in a scheme involving ant farming.^[59]
• On June 27, 2007, former boy band mogul Lou Pearlman was indicted by a grand jury on several counts of fraud and money laundering which for running a $500 million Ponzi scheme over 20 years; he pleaded guilty and was sentenced to 25 years' imprisonment.^[60]
• On March 7, 2008, WinCapita Oy's Internet site was shut down, due to investigation of the company. The company had collected about 100 million euros by this point. This, the so-called biggest pyramid-scheme in Finland was put up by Hannu Kailajärvi and his partner Tiina Wartti. They marketed the company by saying that the company is a successful currency exchange firm and that people can join the club only by invitation. They also marketed the idea for investors by promising net profits of over 400%. In 2013, the court of appeal for Helsinki sentenced Kailajärvi to prison for 5 years and Wartti for one year and 3 months to conditional discharge.
• On May 2, 2008, it was reported that John G. Ervin of Safevest LLC had been arrested by the FBI on suspicion of running a Ponzi scheme that collected $25.7 million, mostly from Christian investors, partly recruited through Ervin's business partner Pastor John Slye and members of his church. Specifically, according to newspaper The Orange County Register, "the company recruited church members to sell the investment to other church members."^[62] Slye had run a cancer research charity, which gave investors confidence. The scheme ran from May 2007 but started to run out of funds by October as investors asked for their money back. Safevest LLC returned $18 million to investors, the rest having been split among five main expenditures, including the two business partners' families, the purchase of a $1 million golf course, and $950,000 for GTS Research Inc. The latter, run by Carl LaRue Godfrey who was previously convicted for "illegal business practices and various other crimes",^[63] was served a Desist and Refrain order by the State of California in August 2007,^[63] the year of the Safevest scheme. GTS Research had claimed to have a patent pending for a new energy source.^[63] The fifth portion, $510,000, was paid to Dennis D. Cope, who had a criminal conviction in relation to a previous Ponzi scheme. Ervin himself had been sued in 2003 for running a separate $7.7 million Ponzi scheme, a fact that could be discovered through an internet search.^[62]
• In March 2008, Val Southwick of Ogden, Utah plead guilty to operating an elaborate real estate investing Ponzi scheme, believed to be the largest in Utah's history with losses of up to $200 million.^[65]
• On August 1, 2008, the WexTrust Investment firm was shut down by the SEC, charging that WexTrust and two of its owners (Joseph Shereshevsky of Norfolk, Virginia and Steven Byers of Oak Brook, Illinois) operated a Ponzi-type scheme by promising unusually high returns to earlier investors and paying them with money raised from later investors. The SEC case, filed in federal court in Manhattan, New York, alleged that WexTrust and the two men defrauded investors by diverting at least $100 million to unauthorized uses. WexTrust targeted the Orthodox Jewish community, particularly in Norfolk, VA and New York City. The receiver, Timothy Coleman, has returned only 2% of principal to WexTrust investors.^[66] Shereshevsky and Byers pleaded guilty to securities fraud, mail fraud and conspiracy, and were sentenced to 21 years and 10 months' imprisonment, and 13 years and four months' imprisonment, respectively, in addition to being ordered to make restitution and disgorge their gains.^[67]
• Business Consulting International was a London-based investment company, that collapsed after being exposed by a City of London Police investigation in 2008 as the United Kingdom's biggest ponzi scheme, estimated at £115 million. The business was set up and run by London-based Indian businessman Kautilya Nandan Pruthi, in partnership with Kenneth Peacock and John Anderson.
• On December 1, 2008, in Saint Cloud, Minnesota, celebrity businessman Tom Petters was charged by the Federal government as the mastermind behind a $3.65 billion Ponzi scheme that bilked investors over a 13-year period. Petters lived an extravagant lifestyle supported by his Ponzi scheme. Petters faces 20 counts of wire and mail fraud, conspiracy, and money laundering for the alleged investment scheme that ran from 1995 through September 2008. He is expected to plead not guilty, but his co-conspirators in the Ponzi scheme, Deanna Coleman, Robert White, Michael Catain, and Larry Reynolds, have all pleaded guilty. The Petters Ponzi scheme came to an end when Petters' top co-conspirator Deanna Coleman turned government informant and wore a wire. Petters and the others were planning to flee to countries without extradition agreements with the U.S. Deanna Coleman and Michael Catain had properties in Costa Rica. On December 2, 2009, Tom Petters was found guilty in the U.S. District Court in St. Paul, Minnesota on 20 counts of wire and mail fraud.^[68] He later was convicted for turning Petters Group Worldwide into a $3.65 billion Ponzi scheme and was sentenced to 50 years in federal prison.^{[citation needed][69]}
• On December 10, 2008, Bernard Madoff, who, through the defrauding of his clients, had created one of the most prominent financial firms on Wall Street, told sons that his investments were "all one big lie". The following day he was arrested and charged with a single count of securities fraud.^[70] As of December 2008^[update] the losses were estimated to be $65 billion, easily making it the largest fraud in history.^[71] Madoff was sentenced to 150 years in prison on June 29, 2009.
• On January 9, 2009, the SEC charged Joseph S. Forte from Broomall, Pennsylvania with masterminding a $50 million Ponzi scheme. He swindled over 80 investors, mostly close friends from 1995 to 2009. The SEC investigator called Forte a "complete fraud". Records show Forte used, for personal purposes, over $28 million.^[72] He was sentenced to 15 years' imprisonment.^{[citation needed]}
• On January 16, 2009, the United Kingdom Serious Fraud Office uncovered an £80 million buy-to-let property fraud scheme operating under a company called Practical Property Portfolio in which at least 1,750 investors were conned out of £25,000 each in return for a promise of a house in the North East of England. All five directors—John Potts, Peter Gosling, Natalie Laverick, Peter Graham, and Eric Armstrong—pleaded guilty to fraud and were sentenced in March 2009.^[73]
• On January 26, 2009, Nicholas Cosmo, founder of Agape World, surrendered to federal authorities in connection with a suspected $380 million Ponzi scheme. Previously convicted of fraud in 1999, Cosmo surrendered at the Long Island Railroad train station in Hicksville, New York and was sentenced to 50 years' imprisonment.^[74] In March 2009, a lawsuit was filed in New York against Bank of America, one of the largest banks in the United States, that claimed that Bank of America "established, equipped and staffed" a branch office in the headquarters of Mr. Cosmo's firm, Agape Merchant Advance. As a result, the lawsuit contends that the bank knowingly "assisted, facilitated and furthered" Mr. Cosmo's fraudulent scheme.^[75]
• On February 9, 2009, the City of London Police Economic Crime Department arrested Terry Freeman, director of GFX Capital Markets Ltd, over a £40 million fraud which is possibly a Ponzi scheme.^[76]
• On February 17, 2009, the Stanford International Bank and proprietor Allen Stanford were accused of "massive fraud" by U.S. authorities, and SIB's assets were frozen. The apparent Ponzi scheme drew in more than $8 billion of "deposits" to Sir Allen's bank in Antigua, many from investors in Latin America. He was arrested by the Federal Bureau of Investigation on June 14, 2009, and sentenced to 110 years' imprisonment on June 14, 2012.^[77]
• On February 25, 2009, the SEC charged James Nicholson for allegedly "defraud[ing] hundreds of investors of millions of dollars"^[78]
• On March 13, 2009, a 67-year-old Ohio woman named Joanne Schneider was sentenced to three years in prison, the minimum allowed, for operating a Ponzi scheme that cost investors an estimated $60 million.^[79] On appeal she was sentenced to 10 years.^{[citation needed]}
• On June 12, 2009, investors were reported to have lost billions of South African Rands in a Ponzi scheme masterminded by Barry Tannenbaum.^[84]
• December 1, 2009: Scott W. Rothstein, a disbarred lawyer and the former managing shareholder, chairman, and chief executive officer of the now-defunct Rothstein Rosenfeldt Adler law firm was accused of funding his philanthropy, political contributions, law firm salaries, and an extravagant lifestyle with a massive $1.4 billion Ponzi scheme. Scott Rothstein turned himself in to federal authorities and was subsequently arrested on charges related to the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act (RICO).^[89] Rothstein was denied bond by U.S. Magistrate Judge Robin Rosenbaum, who ruled that due to his ability to forge documents, he was considered a flight risk.^[90] Although his arraignment plea was not guilty, Rothstein cooperated with the Government and reversed his plea to guilty of five federal crimes on January 27, 2010. He was sentenced to 50 years, despite the prosecution asking for 40 years.^[91]

2010s[edit]

• In 2010, Trevor Cook of Minnesota pled guilty and began serving a 25-year federal prison sentence in connection with the Oxford Group which reportedly took in $194 million. Bo Beckman still has charges pending in connection with the scheme.^{[92][93][94][95]}
• On June 15, 2010, the United States Securities and Exchange commission filed an enforcement action against Matt Jennings and his cohorts and accused them of running a Ponzi Scheme wherein they stole over $53 million from investors.^[101] On December 12, 2012, the court appointed receiver for Westmore entities filed an action against Robert Jennings ^[102] for return of investor funds.^[103]
• In December 2011, the SEC accused Wendell Jacobson and his son Allen, both of Fountain Green, Utah, of operating a $200 million Ponzi scheme that promised to invest in property and made heavy use of the Jacobsons' membership in the LDS Church to recruit victims.^[105] The Federal case was resolved in 2012 with the liquidation of the Jacobsens' company MSI, but Utah officials subsequently filed additional charges in 2015; the case is ongoing as of March 2019.^[106]
• In May 2012, Joseph Blimline was sentenced to 20 years in federal prison for operating two oil and gas Ponzi schemes. He operated a Ponzi scheme from 2003 to 2005 in Michigan, netting over $28 million. He then operated a Ponzi scheme in Texas, using a company called Provident Royalties, that lasted from 2006 to 2009 and netted over $400 million.^[107]
• On August 17, 2012, the SEC filed a federal case against defendants Paul Burks and Zeek Rewards, based out of North Carolina. Paul Burks ran the entity of Zeek Rewards, a fraudulent investment opportunity that promised investors returns as high as 1.5% per day by sharing in the profits of Zeekler, a penny auction. Investors were encouraged to recruit new members to increase their returns. New investors had to pay a monthly "subscription" of up to $99/month and an initial investment of up to $10,000. The higher the initial investment, the higher the returns appeared. The Zeekler entity was an online penny auction that served as a front for the Zeek Rewards entity. Investors in the Zeek Rewards scheme were promised payouts from the profits made on Zeekler by recruiting new members and giving out "bids" that customers would use on the penny auction. While the Zeekler website did bring in revenue, it was only about 1% of what investors believed was being brought into the Zeek Rewards company. The vast majority of dispersed funds were paid out from newly recruited investors. It is believed that the ponzi scheme was a $600M enterprise and the number of affected investors was 1 million when the SEC filed suit. This made Zeek Rewards the largest ponzi scheme in history by number of affected investors, even though numerous other ponzi schemes have had larger enterprise values. Paul Burks paid $4 million to the SEC and agreed to cooperate. It remains unknown how much, if any, of the funds lost in the scheme will be returned to affected investors, as of August 2012.^{[108][109][110]}
• In August 2012, Trendon T. Shavers (aka "Pirate" and "pirateat40"), the founder and operator of "Bitcoin Savings and Trust" (BTCST),^[111] a non existent company advertised over an internet forum, disappeared from the public scene. Shavers raised at least 700,000 Bitcoin in BTCST investments by running it as a Ponzi scheme. The fact that BTCST was run using Bitcoin, makes this a unique instance of a Ponzi scheme. It allowed Shavers to initially stay completely anonymous, making it possible for him to just disappear with the money from his investors. Although some called it a pyramid scheme, BTCST is generally considered a Ponzi scheme. At the time he disappeared, somewhere around August 31, the 700,000 BTC were valued at around US$4,500,000. However, since Bitcoin prices increased significantly since the time it happened, they are now estimated to be worth more than US$2.5 billion. The SEC charged Shavers with securities fraud.^[111] Shavers pled guilty, and on July 21, 2016, he was sentenced to 18 months in prison, and 3 years of supervised release.^[112]
• On September 5, 2012, the Economic Offences Wing of the Tamil Nadu Police arrested M S Guru, the mastermind of a 'contract emu farming' scheme for financial fraud and cheating over 12,000 investors. The filed cases alone amount to over $28 million.^[113]
• On October 1, 2012, a joint raiding operation was conducted on Genneva Malaysia Sdn Bhd and its affiliates by the Royal Malaysian Police, Ministry of Domestic Trade, Cooperatives and Consumerism, Companies Commission of Malaysia, and Bank Negara Malaysia. Singapore's Commercial Affairs Department has also conducted a similar operation against Genneva Pte. Ltd. in Singapore. Estimation of RM10 billion (close to US$330 million) filed cases.^[114]
• In September 2014, the Securities Exchange Commission conducted an emergency asset freeze and filed civil fraud alleging that California-based company, Nationwide Automated Systems, Inc. (NASI), was operating a $123 million ATM ponzi scheme.^[122][123]
• In July 2015, a federal grand jury indicted Edwin Fujinaga, Junzo Suzuki and Paul Suzuki for operating a $1.5 billion Ponzi scheme. Fujinaga operated a company called MRI International Inc. in Las Vegas, Nevada. The company claimed that it collected medical accounts receivable at a discount and then collected the full amount from insurers. The victims were mostly Japanese citizens. Fujinaga and MRI were earlier found liable in a civil suit for $584 million.^[124]
• In June 2013, Brazilian Justice first blocked Telexfree Brazilian operations,^[131][132] and in September 2015, convicted the company for operating a Ponzi Scheme.^[133][134] Telexfree operations in US were shut down by SEC April 2014.^[135][136] In October 2016, Telexfree co-owner James Merrill pleaded guilty.^[137][138] Telexfree was a multibillion-dollar Ponzi scheme desguised as an internet phone service company. Prosecutors have described it as the largest fraud of all time in terms of the number of people affected—more than 1 million, with victims in various countries.^[137]
• In late 2015, the Fanya Metal Exchange in China ceased operations. It was later determined to be a Ponzi scheme and embezzlement fraud. The founder, Shan Jiuliang, was sentenced to 18 years in jail.^[144] Over 220,000 creditors lost 43 billion yuan ($6.7 billion).^[145]
• In December, 2017, the Woodbridge Group of Companies (a/k/a Woodbridge Securities) was charged as an alleged US$1.2 billion Ponzi scheme run by real estate developer Robert H. Shapiro (not to be confused with Attorney Robert L. Shapiro) by The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). On December 4, 2017, Woodbridge and 236 related limited liability companies Woodbridge formed filed for bankruptcy in the Delaware Federal Court. The Woodbridge Group of Companies filed for bankruptcy amid the departure of its chief executive and an investigation into potential securities fraud linked to $1 billion in investments. The Chapter 11 filing on Monday in U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Wilmington, Delaware, cited "unforeseen costs associated with ongoing litigation and regulatory compliance." The SEC had been probing whether Woodbridge defrauded investors who invested more than $1 billion. The agency also sought more information on about 236 "liability companies Woodbridge formed, according to an October SEC court filing. On December 21, 2017 the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission said it had sued luxury real estate developer Shapiro and his Woodbridge Group of Companies for allegedly operating a $1.2 billion Ponzi scheme targeting thousands of investors. According to the SEC’s complaint, Shapiro ran a "sham" business model that allegedly defrauded more than 8,400 investors, including many elderly, in unregistered Woodbridge funds. It said Shapiro promised 5 to 10 percent annual interest on money he said would be used for loans to commercial property owners paying 11 to 15 percent interest rates. "Mr. Shapiro is cooperating with the bankruptcy to protect the assets held for the benefit of Woodbridge’s stakeholders," Ryan O’Quinn, a lawyer for Shapiro, said in e-mail. "He denies any allegation of wrongdoing and looks forward to his opportunity to defend himself in a court of law."
• On January 16, 2018, the cryptocurrency token "Bitconnect" (BCC) plummeted in value after from a high of $331 to $21 within six hours, its market cap declined from a high of $2 billion to $130 million. Bitconnect, which promised 1% daily returns through a "crypto-currency trading bot" was forced to close. The scheme also had a particularly lucrative affiliate program, which promoted users to lure others into the scheme, ultimately leading to lack of new users and collapse in the value of Bitconnect tokens.
• In April 2018, Deepak Jangra and Deepak Malhotra were investigated and arrested by Delhi Cyber Crime for operating a series of bitcoin MLM schemes since 2016.^[148]
• In September 2018, Claud R. "Rick" Koerber of Utah was found guilty of operating a Ponzi scheme promoted a property investment business that took almost $100 million from would-be investors.^[149]
• In November, 2018 Gaylen Rust of Utah was accused of operating a Ponzi scheme masqueraded as a precious metals investment pool generating growth of 25-40% per year, scamming between $47 million and $200 million from more than 200 would-be investors.^[