James Goes to Jail, and then… | James Brandolino Part 2

[00:00:00] A Diction Place Hardball. He would hit me with these verbal attacks. I just said to him,

[00:00:06] I love you so much. You're such an amazing person. I can't take this ride anymore. It was the fact that

[00:00:14] Dad made that sentiment and broke down and years later he told me it had a huge impact on him.

[00:00:22] Sometimes doing what's right for your loved one is the hardest thing to do. Karen is that right thing.

[00:00:27] Visit caroand.org slash lost.

[00:00:31] Everything's changing so fast these days and that's a great thing. I mean back in my day,

[00:00:35] we were lucky if we could get one video to load on our desktop computer but now there's the

[00:00:39] Xfinity 10G network. That means the fastest internet with faster speeds rolling out every day and

[00:00:45] internet that can power a house full of devices at once with ultra low lag. So while one person

[00:00:49] streams a movie from their room another complete video games in the basement while another

[00:00:53] TikToks in the kitchen. It's the next generation 10G network only from Xfinity. The future starts now

[00:00:59] restrictions apply actual speeds vary and not guaranteed.

[00:01:11] Yesterday we talked all about how James Randallino started a hedge fund which was a fraud,

[00:01:16] a pondis game, all the illegal activity. How he went from civil to criminal. This one starts for

[00:01:22] James going to jail and what happened afterwards.

[00:01:30] This isn't your average business podcast and he's not your average host.

[00:01:35] This is the James Altiger show.

[00:01:37] Let me ask you a couple of questions. When you came back from the park and you

[00:01:54] didn't kill yourself fortunately, what did you tell your girlfriend?

[00:01:59] I left my wallet, my watch, everything kind of like on the table.

[00:02:06] I written a bunch of letters and I written under her. She actually worked for a very, very

[00:02:12] large hedge fund which used to be based in Chicago now is based in Florida. I should have

[00:02:18] that. Yes. But she was not in trade. She was on the IT side as a DBA. Anyway, so she saw

[00:02:26] the letter and she read it and she'd called my parents and all that stuff and let them know what

[00:02:33] was going on. When I got back or she knew exactly what was going on and she was dumbfounded.

[00:02:39] This is what I got to do. I've got a contact lawyer and you turn myself in.

[00:02:44] What did your parents say to you? Well, since they were investors, unfortunately.

[00:02:53] To this day, I don't know if kids so I don't understand unconditional love James.

[00:02:59] I just don't understand how they could have been so overwhelmingly supportive at the time

[00:03:09] as they were. Did anyone go with you when you turned yourself in?

[00:03:15] No, at that time no. It was basically just going to the federal willing and walking in there

[00:03:24] with an attorney and doing that. Then probably 10 days later, when I went in for a

[00:03:30] magistrate judge and judges like, well, let's talk about your bail. You're on or out of one

[00:03:34] bail. I want to be incarcerated. He gives me one of those looks. He goes, you're sure right?

[00:03:38] I'll be handed to you the bail. I know you're not going anywhere. I'm like no, I want to be

[00:03:41] incarcerated. Both of those times now, I was by myself. Is that because you were pretty depressed

[00:03:48] and you were worried if you were on your own? You would continue the job of killing yourself?

[00:03:52] Yeah, I don't know. There's probably a pretty good chance that I might have been successful.

[00:03:59] Yes. At this point, had you considered coming clean with your investors before turning yourself in?

[00:04:07] At that point no. Maybe they all would have said, listen, don't turn yourself in. This was

[00:04:14] really bad but we'll deal with it and I don't know what could happen.

[00:04:18] If I had 10 or 15 clients, if I had my initial set, even though I had done criminal activities,

[00:04:27] there was definitely a chance that I could have maybe said, look, if I go to prison,

[00:04:34] nobody's getting any money back or you're going to get very little. Let's work something out

[00:04:38] and I'll get a job. I'll go back to my MBA and be in debt for years and years and years but

[00:04:45] we'll work it out. Probably the majority of not all might have agreed to that.

[00:04:51] At that point, when I decided to go to the feds, no, absolutely not.

[00:04:58] This is a more aiding and a betting type of question but during the financial crisis of 2008,

[00:05:08] late 2007, early 2008 or all 2008 and then early 2009, could you have somehow said to your

[00:05:17] investors, listen, I got caught in all the crossfire with all the bonds. I made a mistake,

[00:05:25] I lost everything. Could you have artificially come clean?

[00:05:28] If I hadn't lost as much money as I had, I probably could have said because you remember the volatility

[00:05:38] during that time even before made-off. When Lehman falling, the trading range in the

[00:05:46] debt, I went from 150 to 200 points. There was 8,000,000 daily swings in that and I probably could

[00:05:56] have used that as an excuse to show some losses and say, hey, we're going to close it up and

[00:06:03] this is going to be the final loss. I probably could have pulled it off but at that point,

[00:06:09] I was down so much. If I was down 30, 40, 50%, I probably could have used that as an excuse and say,

[00:06:15] hey, we're down 25% and let's just pull it up and I'm done, right? But it just didn't work out

[00:06:20] that way. How big did the investors think the fund was? Probably about $400 million.

[00:06:29] Oh my gosh, so that's... Well, and it's something we should kind of talk about because most of my

[00:06:35] investors were high net worth business guides and they were very, very intelligent investors.

[00:06:41] Some of them did their own due diligence and a lot of them hired CPAs and attorneys to do

[00:06:47] their due diligence for them as well. They were visiting my office, looking at the back office,

[00:06:53] looking at records, going through my hedge fund documents, etc., etc., and nobody ever, ever

[00:07:02] figured it out. To this day, I'm just so surprised that some of the things that I told them that they

[00:07:07] couldn't figure out what was going on. I'll give you an example. Three, four months after the

[00:07:12] fund started, I get a phone call, hey, if you were sitting around, do you have audited fund

[00:07:17] just statements? Well, sure. We'd like to get a copy of those. Sure, yeah. I'll give my CPA

[00:07:22] firm a call and I'll get them for you. I think I would have made you do how am I going to get

[00:07:28] audited statements. So when you do, I go to my friend Google and type in hedge fund,

[00:07:34] auditing financial statements.pediaf and get probably seven, eight different examples. I find one

[00:07:40] that's you know, that's you trading securities and it makes them modifications and you know,

[00:07:45] come up with a false, you know, a false audit firm name, a false, you know, CPA who signs it

[00:07:53] and send them out and nobody ever, ever verified that the CPA or the firm was valid and there were

[00:08:02] so many mistakes in over the years in the audit and you take audits that I just said now that

[00:08:07] nobody ever figured it out. I just can't, you know, I just can't believe this. That is so fascinating

[00:08:15] really. I mean, when I saw I ran a fund of hedge funds around that time as well and we would

[00:08:20] always make sure we got the audited statements from the CPA and like we would talk to the CPA

[00:08:27] but you know, I also invested in some funds that I later learned might not have been full

[00:08:33] scams but with a little more work, I was able to see they were investing in companies. They

[00:08:39] started and things like that so different types of scams but there were so many scams going on

[00:08:44] them. Like the hedge fund industry was not as mature then as it is now. Now the scams are really

[00:08:49] clever. So it's some of the stuff that I see just you know, just never ceases to amaze me

[00:08:56] but you know, a big one flying that should have been caught from the very moment. So everybody,

[00:09:00] you know, one of my big sales points it was in my sales literature and in my documents that if,

[00:09:05] you know, a third party CPA firm would be computing all of the returns I would never touch the numbers

[00:09:09] right? They go right from the seat from the brokerage from monthly statements to the CPA firm,

[00:09:14] the CPA firm directly to my investors and of course I buy the software, the hedge fund accounting

[00:09:21] software. So I'm sending the statements on my letterhead with the return address and my business

[00:09:30] envelopes right? So they won't coming from the CPA firm, nobody ever, ever question that.

[00:09:35] And probably one of the one of the biggest james and it's just amazing to me. So a few days

[00:09:44] into 2004 which have been the one year mark of the or the beginning of the following year,

[00:09:51] the fund. I get a phone call from one of my investors. Hey, when do you when you guys sending out

[00:09:56] the tax forms? And then I'm thinking, oh my god, what am I going to do? I've never thought about

[00:10:01] this. It's bad enough now. I understand probably down whatever it was 25% of time I remember.

[00:10:07] And and I'm going to make it back with, you know, I'm committing fraud but there's no way I'm going

[00:10:11] to commit tax fraud, right? Or whatever that is if I'm going to send false tax statements out.

[00:10:16] I go, I go, let me let me find out from my CPA firm and and and I'll call you back. And what I

[00:10:23] ended up telling these guys and for years, not only did they believe it but their CPAs and attorneys

[00:10:29] believed it. So on the future side and you may know this so futures have a kind of a somewhat

[00:10:35] preferred tax status. So everything is short term capital gains, right? But on the future side,

[00:10:41] I believe 40% of the profits can be taxed as long term capital gains so that there's an

[00:10:48] advantage there. But what I basically told everybody was that, you know, as long as the money stays

[00:10:53] in the fund, you don't pay taxes. It's not a taxable event. And I can't tell you over the years

[00:10:58] probably six or seven different different CPAs and or attorneys both on the phone over lunch,

[00:11:05] over dinner explaining this. And you know, it's just it's amazing that nobody called one of

[00:11:12] their colleagues. Hey, this guy, Brian, they always got this hedge fund. This is somebody's

[00:11:16] tongue like mine that there's no taxable event, you know, in terms of, you know, profits.

[00:11:22] And you know, the guy was saying, well, he's not and let's it's an IRA account, right?

[00:11:27] There's actually no way that you don't pay tax on it. And nobody ever, ever caught up on it. So

[00:11:35] they did people just did not do their due diligence. Well, I guess they had their own kind of

[00:11:41] wishful thinking that maybe they didn't even want to ask more questions because then

[00:11:45] they preferred listening to what you told them and they could always just say, well, that's what he

[00:11:49] told me if they're if the IRS came to them. Absolutely. But you know, even even so with with their

[00:11:55] CPS and attorneys who looked at this stuff, I mean, I'm talking, you know, having a 10 minute

[00:12:01] conversation or 15 minute conversation with a CPA and trying to explain to them, you know,

[00:12:07] basically that it's not a taxable event. I mean, I just don't understand what they were thinking.

[00:12:13] I mean, you know, a hedge fund is either a limited partnership or it's an LLC. It's all passed

[00:12:18] through. And I remember sitting at the union league club with with two CPS and one of my investors

[00:12:25] and we're sitting there and and we're getting ready to leave and my investor goes to one of the CPAs,

[00:12:30] hey, I you are comfortable with with what would Jimmy told you? He was, yeah, I just can't

[00:12:36] understand how, you know, how this how this entity does not have to pay tax. I mean, it was right

[00:12:43] it was right there at the hip of his tongue and he didn't think that he would call somebody that he

[00:12:47] knew, you know, one of his colleagues who knew something about hedge funds to say, hey, no,

[00:12:52] it's all passed through. Oh my gosh, well, and you know, $400 million, that was a pretty hefty

[00:13:00] amount at that time to raise like, correct, how were you able to raise that? I mean, that's a what

[00:13:08] was your what was the biggest investment made in your fund? So five so 500,000 was was the largest.

[00:13:16] Yeah, I raised just about yeah, just about $4 million through the whole period. Oh,

[00:13:24] $4 million, not $400 million. Well, that's what I said on my audited statements.

[00:13:30] Because I'm on the audit and federal statements, you know, it shows, you know, basically they're

[00:13:35] auditing for you know, for the existence of assets. So I of course, I had all these assets at

[00:13:40] different broker's terms that I showed. It showed customer assets showed my equity showed. You

[00:13:44] know, a lot of the money that we had support and put was in treasure bills. So it showed all of these

[00:13:48] assets tonight and I showed the last one was probably, you know, it was about $400 million

[00:13:54] in assets. I see. So you wanted to show that because some investors felt comfort that oh,

[00:13:59] he's a big fund. It's legit. Don't worry. As opposed to always being like a $4 million fund.

[00:14:05] Exactly correct. Okay. So so again, it's not like like you you weren't living the rich life. Like

[00:14:14] even if you were pulling money, there wasn't a lot of money to pull from. You still had to like

[00:14:17] create an invest and hire people and so on. So you weren't living the high life and you spent

[00:14:23] seven miserable years stressed out of your mind, you know, losing money and defrauding these investors

[00:14:33] and it just got too much, you know, after the failed suicide attempt, you turned yourself in.

[00:14:39] And then you got a nine year federal prison sentence. I got a nine year sentence. My

[00:14:45] range was eight to 10 years. And initially we thought that I would get a five or six year sentence

[00:14:52] because I get that visit when I was incarcerated at MCC here in Chicago from my attorney,

[00:15:01] hey, do you know anybody on the floor who's committing fraud? Sure, of course, I know a lot of people

[00:15:05] how they're scamming clients. He goes, would you would you consider wedding a wire?

[00:15:10] So they want they wanted to wire me up and put a put a little camera in my in my trading coat

[00:15:17] and basically watch how these guys, you know, run stops on the trading floor and how they're

[00:15:22] basically, you know, you know, begging money, you know, go from different brokers to different traders

[00:15:27] and all that fun stuff. And you know, also there's so much like I don't know like you're not really

[00:15:33] in the stockpits, there were so much inside information that the marker makers have plus their

[00:15:37] trading against customer order flow. Like there's a lot of things they're doing. That's exactly right.

[00:15:43] And it's so easy, you know, in in a trading put situation, it's so easy to, you know, for the broker's

[00:15:49] to let the know the traders were the stops are. So all they do, the traders just run the stops and

[00:15:54] he get these huge sell orders, you know, way, way below. And then, you know, they're buying it and

[00:15:59] then the mark comes back up and you know, they've got all these illegal illicit profits. And it

[00:16:04] it happened, it happened every day especially, you know, especially on days when there's numbers

[00:16:09] coming out and you've got a lot of volatility anyway. And I just, you know, for some reason, although

[00:16:15] you know, the people that I could have kind of put a quote, read it on, you know, I didn't, I didn't

[00:16:22] really particularly care for them but I didn't think it was necessarily fair that I could do it. So

[00:16:26] I said, you know what? I really don't want to do it. You know, because at that point there,

[00:16:30] there'd been no, this is maybe a week as after I was incarcerated. So nothing really had hit the

[00:16:34] hit the wires yet. So nobody would have ever, ever known. If you had agreed to that,

[00:16:39] you think you would avoid a jail time altogether? I don't think I would avoid a jail time. I probably

[00:16:43] might have gotten, you know, four or five years. Instead of my range which was six to eight and

[00:16:50] eight to ten and I got nine years and served six and a half.

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[00:17:39] Everything's changing so fast these days and that's a great thing. I mean back of my day,

[00:17:44] we were lucky if we could get one video to load on our desktop computer but now there's the

[00:17:48] Xfinity 10G network. That means the fastest internet with faster speeds rolling out every day and

[00:17:53] internet that can power a house full of devices at once with ultra low lag. So while one person

[00:17:58] streams a movie from their room, another complete video games in the basement. Well,

[00:18:01] another TikToks in the kitchen. It's the next generation 10G network only from Xfinity.

[00:18:06] The future starts now. Restrictions apply actual speeds very and not guaranteed.

[00:18:10] Wow, so nine years. That's that is a long time and like what were you? What was going through

[00:18:21] your head when you're when you got the sentence of not eight to ten years? Well, I'm gonna think

[00:18:26] I'm gonna take a step back real quick here. So after so I am I'm at my in front of the

[00:18:32] Meditrade judge and refused bond. So basically the federal courthouse is maybe four blocks away from

[00:18:41] the pre trial pre trial holding center at the Metropolitan Correctional Center in Chicago,

[00:18:47] which is literally right across from the Bort and Tray. I could see my office from from from my

[00:18:52] from my quote-unquote room. Anyway, you know, I had never been incarcerated, never of course,

[00:18:57] never even been to to a jail for. And remember just going in and every you know, there's four or

[00:19:02] five of us that went like five o'clock on the afternoon that got into the into the bus to go

[00:19:06] there and you know you go through intake and you get your you know they do a quick medical exam

[00:19:11] and all that stuff. I remember it was probably around six thirty seven o'clock you know

[00:19:15] taking the elevator up to where I was gonna go and you know hitting that doorbell and going in

[00:19:19] everybody you know seeing everybody on the floor you know playing cards and you know start you

[00:19:25] know yelling I got a new guy in the floor and and it just it was just really kind of surreal and

[00:19:30] just there was a lot of fear there but really after kind of you know going to my room and seeing

[00:19:35] where I was gonna stay and talking with my roommate there probably for ten minutes. I knew I made

[00:19:41] the right decision. You know, I don't say it was probably a little bit easier for me my whole

[00:19:46] prison experience than others because I wasn't married and you know kids. I mean it's you know

[00:19:51] when you're in that situation it's much more difficult. I wouldn't say that I enjoyed it or

[00:19:56] having a time but you just try to make the best that you can. Well did you do that first time

[00:20:01] you're incarcerated though like had your girlfriend broken up with you like what happened there?

[00:20:05] Well I mean she no she I mean she knew what was gonna happen. I mean she knew I was like well

[00:20:09] I mean what are we gonna do I know I'm gonna get you know probably a decent prison sentence. I mean

[00:20:14] you know we broke up. I mean I'm not gonna you know hold her to that. I mean not that she would have

[00:20:20] stayed but I mean that wouldn't have been shared her so so it's federal prison so I don't know what

[00:20:26] it's like it's federal prison different from other prisons. Like was it pretty cushy as they say

[00:20:30] like it was a white collar prison? So so where so the MCC and Chicago and I believe they got one

[00:20:36] in Brooklyn were being off state before he was he was actually sentenced. It's there's it's all

[00:20:45] security levels right there's murders there there's child molesters there there's everybody who

[00:20:50] has done anything on the federal side. Typically federal prison is a little bit from my understanding

[00:20:55] is a little bit easier you get longer sentences but it's a little bit easier in federal prison than it

[00:20:59] is on the state side so I was I was in Chicago here for two and a half years and then I ended

[00:21:06] going to a prison camp in Duluth Minnesota and I was there for four years and with which of course

[00:21:13] was much different than being you know in Chicago. What were you mixing with the murderers and the molesters

[00:21:18] and so well you're kind of you're kind of all there I mean you know there's the the rules in

[00:21:24] the big rules where you know you don't you don't mix with you don't mix with either child molesters

[00:21:30] and you don't mix with someone who's been a rat although in that situation everybody's kind of

[00:21:34] you know in you know as there's I think there was six or seven floors where they were it made

[00:21:40] sign and you're kind of kind of like locked in on the floor all all the time so you you kind of

[00:21:48] you kind of talked to everybody so it's a little bit different now when you go toward you're

[00:21:52] going to go then there's a definitely a big royal you know you know whites typically state

[00:21:58] talk say with whites and you know the Mexican gangs stay with that with themselves etc etc.

[00:22:04] The I guess the good thing about the camp was that there's no child molesters that are allowed

[00:22:07] to go there and there are no murders murderers that are allowed to go there of course there are people

[00:22:13] who didn't go to max and you know they maybe got 20 or 30 year sentences and they just walked their

[00:22:18] way down to where their security level allowed them to go to a camp and those were probably the best

[00:22:23] inmates you know the guys that the white collar guys they came in off the street and and basically

[00:22:30] just you know turned themselves in after they were sentenced you know they were I say on bond

[00:22:34] those were those were the worst the worst inmates at all you know the guys who had been you know locked

[00:22:39] up for a while you know we're just really big on I'm the whole respect thing it isn't how you

[00:22:44] conduct yourself and we're all stuck here together so this is how we're going to act but it's it

[00:22:49] was it was it was it was a much different experience than I ever expected it to be I mean it's

[00:22:54] something like you would that you'd see on TV now that I had seen some fights and some people do

[00:22:59] some stupid things and you know and get checked for it really good but it was nothing like I expected

[00:23:05] it to be like you were you felt safe I mean even while I was in Chicago I mean being a white collar

[00:23:11] guy I mean I think it's a little it's it might have been a little bit easier because you know we're

[00:23:16] able to you know help certain inmates if English was out their first language to write letters

[00:23:20] to their loved ones to their lawyers to help go over their paperwork to help them write briefs

[00:23:25] in documents so it would it might have been a little bit easier for us and of course every

[00:23:30] was an oh you stole four million dollars how did you do it and all that kind of you know fun stuff

[00:23:34] but no I never I never really felt unsafe um you know I yeah I never felt unsafe and six and a half

[00:23:44] years so you serve six and a half years did you like I don't know take classes during that time

[00:23:48] we like how did you improve your life during that time or did you just kind of wait it out well

[00:23:53] so relatively early on when I was in incarcerated in Chicago you know I kind of thought what am I

[00:23:59] what am I gonna do I mean I know I definitely I'm gonna be you know barred from the securities

[00:24:04] industry so what am I gonna do and yeah you really have no idea and I go well yeah maybe I can tell

[00:24:08] my story maybe I can you know educate people on you know kind of you know what to look out for but

[00:24:14] nothing really concrete and why when I got up to the camp up in Glutton, Minnesota you know that's

[00:24:22] some some a few CPAs who were you know who were you know from major firms and it's like oh my

[00:24:30] gosh you really should maybe get the consulting and doing this stuff I mean you've got a great story

[00:24:35] and you've seen a lot of things so they recommended yeah I feel I was sitting in a bunch of books

[00:24:40] I interviewed a bunch of other inmates who would commit crime and basically came up with about

[00:24:48] 100 bread flags that you know either directly or indirectly lead to investment fraud and you

[00:24:53] know what's interesting James is that you know what even with the advent of the internet everything

[00:24:58] nothing's really changed I mean you know the same types of of mechanics and fraud are being

[00:25:05] committed today as they were in the 50s and 60s you know I looked at probably you know dozens hundreds

[00:25:12] of cases on the fit on the federal and state side that I was able to pull while you know while I

[00:25:16] was incarcerated and just you know the same red flags you know are there today as they were

[00:25:24] you know 2034 years ago so what are some of the red flags and that's really when I decided that

[00:25:28] I would I wanted to try to make a difference in terms of preventing investment fraud

[00:25:32] and what are some of the red flags that just surprise you still exist today um wow so I would say

[00:25:40] number one the biggest the biggest problem I see is people tend to want to profile fraudsters right

[00:25:48] it's it's the the whole perception is that a fraudster is the use car sale man right and the

[00:25:56] use car sale man where I was gonna you know push to send money in and call every day twice a

[00:26:02] day to try to get them to invest their 5 10 15 20 thousand dollars whatever it might be and that

[00:26:07] you know and that what's interesting is that there is no profile I mean it you could take the

[00:26:12] opposite sides of this document I'm just writing about this I'm working on the book as we speak

[00:26:17] and you know it was interesting somebody could be you know 80 years old or seven years old as

[00:26:22] made off was or someone as you know young and attractive as an Elizabeth Holmes from Theranos right

[00:26:30] and you know have everything in between in terms of education and career experience and

[00:26:38] and and and personal assets etc etc and it doesn't matter who the person is you can't you can't

[00:26:46] pigeonhole a person if they're a fraudster or not you have to check everybody out um because I find

[00:26:53] that most investors who lose money of most big investors will lose money to someone like a

[00:26:59] made off or myself someone who is probably a little quieter a little more introverted kind of like

[00:27:05] well you know here's the investment if you want to invest great if not great I'll just you know

[00:27:09] that there's plenty of other people want to invest versus someone who is you know the use car salesman

[00:27:15] and who's pushing all the time and yeah a lot of people fall for that but those are the you know

[00:27:19] probably the small investors the five or ten thousand dollar accounts so to speak but in terms of

[00:27:25] the investors who invest with someone like myself or a made off that's where the big frauds occur

[00:27:31] because you know they're they're not pushy there you know they they they cross their keys they

[00:27:36] they've got their eyes in terms of of other documents and their and their career history

[00:27:42] and they look a lot less likely to commit fraud so that that's probably the biggest one

[00:27:50] and like what's who pieces of advice would you give to someone who's doing due diligence on

[00:27:55] whether it's a fund or a company or whatever number one audit financial statements

[00:28:03] uh and and then this this goes not just to verify if the individual CPA and the and the audit from

[00:28:11] our legitimate because I mean you can easily go to one of the state accounting boards and see

[00:28:17] or go to I believe CPA verify uh dot com and and check out if they're they're valid but the question

[00:28:24] comes in you have a document in your hand did that actual CPA did he actually

[00:28:29] perform that audit and that is probably the hardest thing to do because I because maybe maybe

[00:28:36] the CPA performed that audit in its entirety maybe maybe the the operator is just pulling you know

[00:28:42] a name a guy's name and I had to use a company name from Deloitte right just picked some random

[00:28:47] now random CPA there puts Deloitte on there and oh Deloitte no problem I don't have to check this out

[00:28:54] yeah we know we know Deloitte is probably the the biggest issue that I see quite often is a

[00:29:02] a valid CPA and firm performing an audit and the operator going in and taking one two or three

[00:29:09] pages of financials and changing some of the numbers adding a couple zeros but we're going

[00:29:13] to have a few decimal points so in turn if if we were to call the CPA firm we could verify

[00:29:20] that yes he did that audit for that particular company but is it the exact audit that he did

[00:29:27] and I think the the biggest issue and it's still a good big aside you know a lot of CPAs won't

[00:29:31] even confirm at times that they did the audit or that that that that a particular fund or company

[00:29:37] is their clients um but it's really important to get a copy from them directly of that audit

[00:29:45] because you just never know what's been changed and sometimes you can change one or two numbers

[00:29:49] it's not like you know they're they're massaging all the numbers maybe just you know what are two

[00:29:53] numbers and that's really all you need to you know to to fool people but yeah to your point like

[00:29:59] the hedge fund manager could be delivering to the accountant all the bank statements but those

[00:30:03] bank statements could be manipulated like how do you check that well so while you you really have

[00:30:08] to talk to the CPA firm eight well how did you get these I mean most CPA firms that what that

[00:30:14] are doing audits these days are gonna are gonna get the bank statements directly and the

[00:30:18] appropriate statements directly from the financial institutions themselves are not gonna they're

[00:30:23] not gonna get them from that the hedge fund operator right and how do they do they log in to the

[00:30:28] same account that the hedge fund manager uses or or they call the bank and say send me these

[00:30:33] statements but then someone in the bank could be in collusion or the number could be fake or whatever

[00:30:38] so basically they uh the the auditor firm is gonna send a for every institution is gonna it's

[00:30:44] basically sending a form to the hedge fund operator that basically giving the firm the right to release

[00:30:50] those statements to the to the audit for and for the purposes of an audit now if you have

[00:30:56] individuals at the bank who are you know are in on it and helping fund your numbers then

[00:31:02] at that point yeah it's it'd be really really really tough to to find that for out although you

[00:31:08] I haven't seen that personally yeah I guess that's rare but it it would be rare um yeah i'm just

[00:31:15] trying to think about a case in Chicago back in the day that um a big future firm that one under

[00:31:21] but even that note that the statements were coming directly directly to the to the CEO and he was

[00:31:26] he was fudging up before the CPAs got it yeah but the CPA has to get those documents directly

[00:31:33] from the financial institutions i think of frauds that i've seen where for instance one manager

[00:31:38] would take really like long dated futures with with no volume on it and with one trade

[00:31:47] at the end of the year or the end of the month you know make one trade like six thousand percent higher

[00:31:52] again there was no volume in this market nobody looked at it it was like maybe 2027 you know

[00:31:58] leaps on some weird option and uh and so they he'd be able to mark out this portfolio that way

[00:32:04] uh uh and there there was no way to like an uh an audit wouldn't help like there was no way to

[00:32:09] to know he was doing this manipulation well i and i think to to your point i would even take

[00:32:14] that further and say i think that most auditors if they don't understand the

[00:32:20] the products that they are auditing uh it makes a big difference so for example i

[00:32:26] my third or fourth month in operation i had a a gentleman an investor bring his CPA with him

[00:32:34] to come see my operation this gentleman already invested with me and i didn't only this bringing

[00:32:38] to CPA and um he had a he had statements with them he goes i want i want to see a copy to make

[00:32:44] see the trade that you did for these three months and make sure that they that they comply with

[00:32:48] you know what you actually traded so i went to my file cavern and i pulled my three monthly statements

[00:32:52] right we walked uh my office was actually inside of my clearing firm and we watched the back

[00:32:58] conferences they say um nancy this is a CPA he's well he into my books can you pull my three

[00:33:04] monthly statements of all my trades for you know the first three months is the fun he she pulled them

[00:33:09] they all they all matched and uh everything you know he didn't recognize uh any issue with it

[00:33:16] all the fact that i should have been if if he would have understood the futures market he would

[00:33:21] have realized well you're not trading the kind of size then you should be if you were um

[00:33:29] you know if you were managing as much money as you said you were managing and what was it

[00:33:33] to be your answer if he did uh uh understand that uh i don't know i would have i would have had

[00:33:40] to say something well you know there's i you know i traded other firms and i did have a you know

[00:33:46] uh i was using i think a total of four other futures commission merchants or broker firms

[00:33:51] to to to do trades and i would have had a concoct something up um actually this was not the first year

[00:33:56] this was actually the the second year because i was actually i think i at the time i was said i was

[00:34:01] managing twenty five million dollars or whatever i said what i was managing so but anybody who understood

[00:34:07] the futures market you know i was you know trading let's just say you know 20 lots in the s&p's where

[00:34:13] i should have been trading probably fifth year six year seventy lots right to to earn those kind

[00:34:17] of returns so i mean really anybody who understood that market and what the tick value is on on futures

[00:34:23] and you could really just go in with a calculator and and just kind of work backwards where you made

[00:34:28] one point three percent this month you need to make this amount but you only trade in this size it

[00:34:32] just doesn't make sense and so i mean another type of fraud that i've seen there there's one guy

[00:34:39] who is a multi-billion dollar legit hedge fund manager now he's in the news almost every single day

[00:34:44] and i remember back in two thousand two two thousand three he was getting in trouble because

[00:34:49] so he took half of his then hedge fund he has different one that he started since half of his

[00:34:54] then hedge fund and he just like bought like random golf courses or something else and uh

[00:35:00] like that he wasn't supposed to be trading and he lost all the money and somehow he restarted

[00:35:05] and now is a multi-billion dollar hedge fund like do you ever feel we're that some of these guys

[00:35:11] who should have been frauds ended up getting away with it completely and now are a hundred percent

[00:35:17] quote unquote legit and billionaires no i i really don't you know my my my doing was you know

[00:35:28] between me myself and i and i just i made a really really bad decision i made a bad decision

[00:35:34] to not trade my original strategy and i made a bad decision to hide it yeah no i'm not saying

[00:35:40] you should have gotten away with it i'm saying this guy i can't stand it when i see that other guys

[00:35:48] got away with it and i don't know how they did it it was just like out of charisma or

[00:35:55] some weird factor that they were they everybody knew what they were doing but they weren't i don't know

[00:36:00] maybe i'm just talking randomly but i'm thinking of one guy in particular who's famous hedge fund manager

[00:36:06] now and i'm thinking like i always wonder like how did he avoid not going to jail when it was

[00:36:10] public knowledge what what he did even had to shut his fund down and the whole thing and then he

[00:36:15] survived well it probably wasn't it probably wasn't criminal i mean you know it would probably just

[00:36:21] be he probably he probably was sued civilly i can't imagine if he lost that much money

[00:36:24] he had a close the fund at a loss if if he was trading or if he if well if he was trading or

[00:36:30] buying assets uh that were not specifically disclosed in his in his hedge fund documents um i mean

[00:36:38] that that would be considered potentially fraudulent and it's a civil it's a civil offense so

[00:36:43] he probably was sued so in terms of him uh he probably wouldn't have been um prohibited from

[00:36:50] starting another fund um and if he was at charismatic in terms of raising money i mean raising money

[00:36:55] is raising money right he probably has a pretty big network and you know was able to do it and do

[00:37:00] really well yeah no i know i know more i think about the more i think of examples of this type of

[00:37:05] thing where i was just they got away with like what i would consider a abhorrent behavior and

[00:37:12] and somehow survived and and you know lived to be even bigger i mean you know i just remember from

[00:37:18] the day when i was an apps manager uh and you know there was uh there was that not so much on

[00:37:24] our desk but on on the institutional desk right next to me there was you know a bunch of

[00:37:29] of of hedge funds on their names i'm sure that you would recognize and there was situations

[00:37:34] where we had to kind of move trades that were losers for a couple days especially going from

[00:37:40] the end of one month and the beginning of the other month so they go from you know from error

[00:37:44] account aid error account seed error account you know l uh and then the next month we move back into

[00:37:50] into their error account which we could hold it until the end of the month again and i remember

[00:37:55] you know even for some of our clients that we have to do that and that's just kind of in terms

[00:37:59] of moving stuff around um that's kind of how i even thought about well you know i'll trade in my

[00:38:04] own account and i can i can move both losers into my personal account and take the winners from

[00:38:08] my personal account and move them to um you know to that but the funds i was doing at just the opposite

[00:38:14] most most fund managers are traders who are managing investor capital they're they're taking all the

[00:38:19] winning trades from the fund and putting them into their personal account right and vice versa i was

[00:38:23] doing just the opposite i was taking the losers from the fund and putting them into my individual account

[00:38:28] right and then all the winners from my individual account were getting moved over to uh to the hedge fund

[00:38:34] account so yeah it was it was it was a baffle

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[00:39:07] everything's changing so fast these days and that's a great thing i mean back of my day we were

[00:39:12] lucky if we could get one video to load on our desktop computer but now there's the xfinity 10G

[00:39:17] network that means the fastest internet with faster speeds rolling out every day and internet

[00:39:22] that can power a house full of devices at once with ultra low lag so while one person streams a movie

[00:39:26] from their room another complete video games in the basement while another tick tocks in the kitchen

[00:39:30] it's the next generation 10G network only from xfinity the future starts now restrictions

[00:39:36] apply actual speeds vary and not guaranteed honestly i don't think i would ever trust a hedge fund at

[00:39:44] this point not because of this conversation but just in general i've told people i don't really trust

[00:39:50] hedge funds because he just never really know because because it's not possible for like a small

[00:39:54] individual to do the kind of due diligence you're talking about you're just kind of like going on

[00:39:58] maybe if something was run by like the you know blackrock or something like that then okay it's

[00:40:03] probably legit but it's just hard to trust and that's why i guess that hedge fund business

[00:40:10] the hedge fund industry in general has become more institutionalized because i would never trust

[00:40:14] certainly a small hedge fund anymore yeah well it it's really tough and i would say in terms of

[00:40:20] you know that that's why the audits are so important because you know audits mean a lot of things

[00:40:24] to a lot of people but in terms of hedge funds i mean do the assets exist are they real right as

[00:40:30] a cashier you know are they in securities what where are they at how are they valued if they're not

[00:40:34] marked a market right it's not being traded how they mark the market and number three how are they

[00:40:39] costed and a lot of what it's now are basically you know being checking the the monthly performance

[00:40:46] returns to making sure that they are being computed correctly as well you know how how they

[00:40:51] are marked is a huge issue because take a private equity fund or or take a pipe fund where they get

[00:40:58] locked up shares at a discount are they valuing them at the discount even though the shares

[00:41:02] were locked up or they or did they get them at the discount and then mark them at full value just so

[00:41:06] they could get their fees on them like an accounts go along with it like a count go along with whatever

[00:41:11] the manager says in many cases well and a big reason is that because the accounts don't even know

[00:41:17] I mean i bet there's a there's a there's a pants and skiing that i'm investigating as we speak

[00:41:21] and you know it's a multi-familitary family it looks like it could be 25 30 million dollars

[00:41:28] and you know i'm having a problem you know looking at the valuations and on some what what

[00:41:33] the stuff should be valued at and and a lot of times the CPAs don't know or they'll you know

[00:41:38] they'll even go to the fund manager say which you know which give me a range of what this should

[00:41:43] be worth that gives them something that they can kind of work back on and support because a lot

[00:41:48] of times i mean it would just be ungodly expensive James for these guys to come in and and figured out

[00:41:55] and and and multi-family and property real estate is much easier than you know some of some of

[00:42:00] some of these other derivatives that are out there i mean some that trades on an exchange that's

[00:42:03] marked a market is i mean it's you know reiner right that's the easiest the easiest you know

[00:42:08] uh piece to evaluate but in terms of the other stuff it's really difficult and the

[00:42:12] CPAs just you know just pull their hair out trying to evaluate some of the stuff

[00:42:18] so so you get out of jail and like did you actually start getting hired to be a fraud investigator

[00:42:23] or like what happened so probably three four months after i was released i was released in

[00:42:30] July of 17 i started just doing a bunch of just kind of free talks telling my story to

[00:42:38] you know local chamber i'm in outside of chicago so uh give it to the commerce rotary etc etc

[00:42:45] and within the first three or four months i'll do in those talks um there was a

[00:42:51] a law firm that was uh a few of the partners were at hurt my talk and we talked a couple times

[00:42:58] and actually they they give me a lot of consulting business to you know come in and and and pick up

[00:43:04] the pieces which i really kind of don't like i i'm i really i'm trying to make the move and be more

[00:43:09] on the proactive side be in the preventative side of course you know a lot of investors sometimes

[00:43:15] don't see how important it is that it's better to pay upfront uh you know a fee to have somebody

[00:43:21] come and do the due diligence rather than you know pick up the pieces and try to find out where

[00:43:25] the money's at yeah or i wonder even within like a wonder and does it do insurance companies get

[00:43:31] involved in this at all or um you know not not so much um you know i would say probably my my last

[00:43:38] three clients have been xx professional athletes and that's the area that i really want to

[00:43:44] really want to focus on actually there's athlete uh there's an athlete that is invested in

[00:43:48] this multi-family and you know probably in his career he probably only made $15 20 million dollars

[00:43:54] so you can you know after taxes and after paying all the fees to his you know business manager

[00:43:58] an agent you can imagine what's what's left of that and he invested about six hundred thousand

[00:44:02] dollars so that's a big piece of his of of of of what he had left and he's probably going to lose

[00:44:10] most of it if not all that and you know a lot of these x-athletes just get crushed in terms of

[00:44:16] you know ideas and you know business propositions from their family and friends but also you know

[00:44:21] from their agents and managers and not that there's there's male intention valve you know that

[00:44:25] what's interesting i just can't say this enough most most professionals don't know how to evaluate

[00:44:32] these types of of private investments um yeah so you should market yourself like this to sports

[00:44:39] agents like do you know david malter uh i know and i've seen my facebook quite a bit

[00:44:45] yeah cuz i do that no personal we've been on the podcast and i've been on his show

[00:44:49] jay who's who's the producer here he's listening jay can you introduce james to david malter

[00:44:54] send an email and reducing the two of them and you should meet him because he deals with a lot of

[00:44:59] clients and i've seen i've seen some sports but who is that guy he's got the same name as like

[00:45:05] clinton's old lawyer and he was doing a Ponzi thing and he went to jail for a long time and he was

[00:45:10] investing primarily athletes money think i remember before i was really was a fraud i was trying

[00:45:16] to raise money from him and he was like why should i invest with you i return like double

[00:45:20] you return and it turns how it like all his returns are fraud so horrible yeah it's it's a shame

[00:45:28] it's it's a shame that you know i always you know kind of end up my presentations with you know

[00:45:33] the the the story you know my my fraud lasted for literally eight years and you know my hindit worth

[00:45:40] clients performed due diligence themselves or they they found it out to their you know to their

[00:45:46] attorneys and their CPAs and IRA independent trust companies and bank trust officers uh

[00:45:52] their offices dot the downtown style line in chicago and what were the results that my fraud lasted

[00:45:58] for eight years that either and and really either they didn't do the work james or they just

[00:46:03] didn't know what to look for and i think i think that's probably the bigger part of my story you know

[00:46:08] i i do a lot of continuing education talks for you know audit firms and law firms they want to hear

[00:46:14] my story and look my story is great this is what i did i'm open anonymous there's no question

[00:46:19] I will not answer and this is what i'm doing now and that's all great but i think the bigger picture

[00:46:24] as how could someone like me you know full so many people for so long and the the thing is i didn't

[00:46:31] fool anybody nobody nobody it did the right amount of due diligence to define my fraud anybody

[00:46:41] you know who you know if it was me investing my fraud i want to find out found out the first hour

[00:46:46] of of doing you know the analysis and you ever run into any old investors and

[00:46:53] you know are they upset at you so well you know i've talked i reached out to all of them

[00:46:58] and i've sat with of my um so i would say of my 62 investors i've sat with probably at 12 or 13

[00:47:08] and you know i just kind of want to let them know well of course apologize profusely but just

[00:47:14] to kind of let them know it wasn't like i took their money and like i was like jet setting in a

[00:47:18] private jet a little bit of place and i think that's what a lot of people don't realize and i'm

[00:47:23] just gonna i'm not gonna say it's with with all fraudsters but definitely with myself you know

[00:47:27] i really compare it to if you've seen the movie starface without butchino and you know you

[00:47:34] see all this heartache you see this in the middle of the film there's like that two-minute montage

[00:47:40] i keep remembering the song they play push it to the woman maybe right and he's getting very

[00:47:44] he's driving the car and show the house and it's all of this smiles and laughs and all that stuff

[00:47:49] and the rest of the movie is just kind of like depressing right and shows the struggles that he's

[00:47:54] had that he has and that that's i really can't say that enough how how difficult it was

[00:48:00] that knowing that that this is on my back and that people that that people should find out

[00:48:05] every day and just walking down the i mean just go being on the on the trading floor right

[00:48:10] and seeing a couple you know you'll see a guy or two you know walk in the floor with you know

[00:48:13] with dark suits and white shirts oh my god is that the FBI is at yes he's see is that to my

[00:48:18] future's trading commission it's just living like that was was just pure hell i think a lot of

[00:48:23] people don't realize that um and of course you know some clients you know don't want to meet and

[00:48:28] you know i can i can respect that you know absolutely i i think um and i'd be pushing the

[00:48:33] limit here a little bit i think most of the individuals who don't want to meet with me really

[00:48:38] realize that they could have done the due diligence and found out early on that i was a fraud um

[00:48:45] yeah first of obviously you're at fault and you went to jail for it and you're not denying that

[00:48:52] well i 100% blame the clients for investing in you as well well so i so i so i i i can't

[00:48:58] because of my story i can't blame them um although i you know in my talks why when i talk to

[00:49:04] you know investor groups you know i have a very i have a big couple of message you know one of my

[00:49:08] biggest former investors what one of my biggest fans on the internet um just way i'm based

[00:49:14] me and and i get it i understand he's upset even even even to this day but understand that this

[00:49:18] person was a former investigative reporter for the Chicago chrysanthemum and worked and after they had

[00:49:25] um he he left to work for a major major corporate security firm in Chicago where and he was on

[00:49:32] location at Wal-Mart in a lot of places i mean this hasn't this guy has an investigative you know

[00:49:38] DNA right and you know he was in the war numerous times and we had spent you know many many

[00:49:44] lunches and dinners together over the years and you know a lot of these guys asked the right

[00:49:49] questions but you know they they just didn't know how to verify the truth and that would be probably

[00:49:56] the biggest thing you know everybody you know you see these the documents and and and marketing

[00:50:01] pieces and all that kind of stuff and that's all great right even you know even and i want to

[00:50:06] get into this for a minute i'm the financial advisor was kind of financial advisor fraud you know

[00:50:10] even like the RIAs then you know they have their you know their their documents required that the

[00:50:15] SEC i mean anybody can write anything they want in there the question is is going in there and

[00:50:21] and proving are they doing what they say they're doing and that's probably the hardest the hardest

[00:50:28] piece to do to to verify are are they doing what they say that they're doing and a lot of times

[00:50:34] though hedge funds will say listen um this information is proprietary like if you're investigating for

[00:50:40] instance you know intricacies of a deal they do like not not again like the vanilla hedge funds

[00:50:45] that just buy and sell stocks but they're doing more complicated deals they might or or they're

[00:50:50] trading some esoteric derivatives and they might say this information to investors this information

[00:50:56] for proprietary we don't give it out what do you do about those situations when you're doing due

[00:51:01] diligence um so so when i'm when i'm hired it's one of two things right uh i get one of two phone

[00:51:08] calls it's of either somebody hey i've got this this this hedge fund or this private equity or whatever

[00:51:13] it may be that i want to invest in i've got all the documents you know what would you charge to

[00:51:17] you know to do it i you know look i'll look through and we'll have a conversation and yeah

[00:51:20] and the manager knows that somebody's gonna call him and he's more than happy to talk to you

[00:51:25] right so that that's relatively easy on the other side you know you know games i

[00:51:30] I invested in this hedge fund or this whatever this private company you know a year ago

[00:51:35] now i'm making a lot of money there's no problems right but you know that the statements are

[00:51:39] coming a little bit like now and when i call if i email or call and leave the message it takes

[00:51:43] a week to get back to me now i'm not concerned but i need you to go in and and and and and and

[00:51:49] you know kick it around and see what you can find but definitely don't let anybody know that you're

[00:51:54] that you're you know you're you're doing due diligence on them and don't mention my name

[00:51:59] and that's where i get to the little bit difficult but to go back to what you said in terms of

[00:52:03] both hedge funds i mean look i don't necessarily need to see the positions i don't want i don't

[00:52:07] want to see your strategy i don't want to see your positions i mean even if i can only verify

[00:52:12] your your back office how is your back office working how does that structure working and even

[00:52:17] though there may not be fraudulent on so even if a particular fund or particular management

[00:52:23] company is absolutely clean you know is there is there back office infrastructure is it prone to

[00:52:32] potential fraud in the future you know how are the separation of duties is there a third party

[00:52:39] that's in no that that administrator that's handling a lot a lot of those

[00:52:44] transaction that's hailing the money in money out that's doing all the that's computing the numbers

[00:52:49] and what does that look like because you know even you don't made off wouldn't let people

[00:52:54] for a long time although i have copies of some of the of the audits that he actually had

[00:53:04] had done or not he had done but his firm is accounting for him did and they were very i mean

[00:53:10] they were very minisual at the very least um you know there's nothing looking at somebody's back

[00:53:16] office there's no intellectual property there there there's no edge that if i know how your back

[00:53:22] office works i'm going to be able to you know you know front you're selling on your orders right

[00:53:28] because i don't even need right needs to know what you're trading i mean love yeah i guess i

[00:53:32] want to know what you're trading but you know what i mean i don't need i don't need to see

[00:53:37] all of that to i just need to see your back office and how it's set up let's go there and then

[00:53:43] you know we i can make a better decision but it's just it's just amazing how many you know how many

[00:53:49] investors will just kind of you know stop short of that man James Randallino you gave

[00:53:56] given me so much to think about and sounds like your six and a half years in jail were more satisfying

[00:54:04] life experience than the six and a half years prior to that where you were just dealing with this

[00:54:07] hell of committing fraud and well you being going and so on yeah you know i hope i don't get

[00:54:12] trouble by saying is that i'm not sure if i've ever said it on a podcast before um but you know if

[00:54:18] look i wish i would have made different decisions right i wish i would have the guts to tell my clients

[00:54:24] that you know what was actually going on but i didn't and things happen before what they happened

[00:54:28] and i you know i say now that you know if i would have known how my experience was in federal

[00:54:35] prison how it actually turned out to be i would have turned myself in a long before

[00:54:40] i did um you know it was just uh you know for me was just uh it was just a big kind of time out

[00:54:49] that you know able to you know really you know handle mental health issues and really see what

[00:54:54] you know what what am i going to do now that i can't go back to the industry and that i spent my

[00:54:59] you know my entire career wanting to you know you know wanting to be in what am i going to do now

[00:55:04] how can i make a road difference how can i make you know a mens with you know with my investors

[00:55:10] how can i you know how can i make a real difference in in quantitatively reducing the amount of

[00:55:17] victims and the amount of fraud that's going on and then since getting out of jail like when you

[00:55:23] first started like i don't know dating again was it a problem that you were in jail for all these

[00:55:28] years like how did you get over that hurdle um it was a long time i just started dating really uh

[00:55:34] probably uh probably a couple uh a year and a half ago or so so you know it's with my schedule

[00:55:41] it's it's been really really tough um you know what what's interesting is that you know when i

[00:55:48] when i do a lot of it my life speaking events you know i'll get you know people come up to me and say

[00:55:54] it's like boy if i wasn't married i would you know i'd want to date you because you know i really

[00:55:58] respect with you know what you're doing and you know and you're really turning your life around so

[00:56:03] it's just a matter of you know just meeting the right person but it's it it's definitely a

[00:56:08] and it's definitely been a showstopper as well i mean for some people it's a little bit more baggage

[00:56:13] than than they want and yeah and and and i accept that you know i just you know my my focus

[00:56:19] you know whether it's somebody that i'm dating or my former investors or somebody who just says

[00:56:23] and you don't like me or want to do business that's great because my focus is on you know

[00:56:27] my clients and making sure that they don't invest in anything that it's gonna be toxic uh and

[00:56:33] they're gonna what do they face a a total or partial loss of assets well James Brandt and Lino thanks

[00:56:40] you know so much for coming on the show and sharing this really intense story uh and

[00:56:46] and being so forthrighted honest about it and and i hope the work that you're doing now

[00:56:52] succeeds in saving people a lot of a lot of money because i i believe i still think there's

[00:56:57] a lot of fraud out there like you said it never stops it never changes and this is an important

[00:57:01] message like investing is not simple and there's a lot of there's a lot of things against you not

[00:57:08] just the markets which could be against you also but then all these other situations like these

[00:57:14] frauds or or or there's a lot of things where i call like near frauds where you know everything's

[00:57:20] disclosed but it's in the fine print and it's and it's really unethical behaviors occurring even

[00:57:25] might not be labeled as fraud fraud so yeah i mean it's hard enough for investors to make money

[00:57:32] you know with legitimate investments and i think most investors are more concerned about the

[00:57:38] the quality of the investment itself in chianate ruin the the type of returns that the operator says

[00:57:44] it is and that's kind of where they focus it on they don't focus on you know dysphrodica

[00:57:49] if fraud occurs or will it occur so yeah well thanks again and good luck and when you have a book

[00:57:56] come back on uh back on the show we'll talk about all the all the types of frauds there are thank

[00:58:01] you James thanks James take care

[00:58:18] i'm general manager ethan rossignol at dark ars toyota in silver spring inventory is the best

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