Investor's Watchdog.com: Stock, finance and investment protection for investors

Investor’s Watchdog knows the future of investment fraud.  It details what’s coming on the Crystal Ball page of its website.  One of the broad categories of scam that we can expect to see more often is the “green energy” scam.  No one who remembers five dollar per gallon gasoline can fail to appreciate the need for green technology.  Scam artists know this, and they structure their scams with that knowledge in mind.

The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (‘SEC”) has charged Mantria Corporation, Troy B. Wragg, Amanda E. Knorr, Speed of Wealth, LLC, Wayde M. McKelvy, and Donna McKelvy, with raising $30 million from 300 investors through such a scam.  According to the SEC, the defendants told investors that they would invest in environmentally friendly investment opportunities.  Instead, says the SEC, the defendants ran a Ponzi scheme. Among the supposed green initiatives that the defendants used to solicit investments were a supposed “carbon negative housing community” and a “biochar charcoal made from organic waste.”  According to the SEC, none of the investments is legitimate.

Scam artists are students of human reactions.  They know what motivates.  They know the objections that they will have to overcome to convince you to invest.  Tens of thousands of senior citizens are now starting over with nothing because they believed they could distinguish between a  fraud and a legitimate investment without help.  Scam artists count on the human tendency to do-it-yourself.  If you need the nest egg you worked so hard to accumulate, though, the safer choice is to get help from someone who is in the business of spotting the best-disguised frauds.