The BBC reports on an interesting example of a very modern scam: US charges British twins over $1.2m 'stock robot' fraud.
The scam had two parts. For investors, there was the the "stock picking robot" called Marl, which supposedly told you which stocks to buy. You could buy a copy of Marl for $28,000 - or get a newsletter featuring Marl's wisdom, for just $47.
In reality Marl didn't pick anything. The stock tips were provided by the teenage scammers, the Hunters, themselves. Not because they thought they were good stocks, but because the companies behind the stocks paid the Hunters fees for their promotional services via a separate "equitypromoter.com".
What's interesting about the scheme is that everything "worked", just not the way it was meant to. Investors paid to get tips as to what stocks would rise; they did rise, just not for the reasons they thought.
So Marl ...
