Warning of boiler room fraud

Business Entrepreneurship
1

Not sure if this is the appropriate sub-forum but I thought I post it here as it concerns “Money”.

A couple of weeks ago I got a call from some lady with an Indian accent, she wanted to send me information about their company.
I receive a bunch of calls like this (mainly due to one of my functions is to do business development).
They just confirmed my work address, that’s all.

Few days later I got mail in the office (FedEx) containing only some glossy brochure with a dubious Korean
business card from a company called “Shaw Capital” attached to it. The company claimed to be a private investment firm.
I checked their website for fun and noticed its probably a scam (no phone numbers on the website, looks like a loooot of stock photos):
See shaw-capital.com/

Yesterday I got a call by “Mark” which said he is my investment Advisor of Shaw Capital and wanted to know if I received the information.
His voice sounded like some kind of alcoholic, convincing me to order another beer.
He asked if I know “BHP” (yeah, well, who doesn’t know the biggest mining company in the world…) and he asked me to “listen carefully”
cause ER5 (aka Eldora Gold Ressources) which is on the Frankfurt Exchange was about to sign a deal with BHP but its no public news yet.
He said its very important that this deal goes through as its the first deal we’d make and to build trust. The minimum investment being 5000 Euros.
I said “I have to check more on that company” (which I actually did in the same time as talking to him, given that I’m in front of my notebook the whole day).
Now ER5 is indeed on the Frankfurt stock exchange, on the so called “Open Market” (which basically means “Wild West Market”).
I told him that I don’t invest on the Open Market and that I could just follow it anyways regardless of buying it or not, to see how legit he is.
So he started to talk about that the book of the “rich stock watcher” (catchy!) still had to be written and tried to push me again into going for it.
So I searched for Shaw and Eldora and got to this news page: guardian.co.uk/money/2011/ju … ares-scams
I then asked “Mark” if he knows that his company is on a warning list in the U.K. and he said “uhm but you are not in the UK?”
When I asked him if he knows what is a “boiler room fraud” and that I don’t want to give him any penny the conversation was quickly over.

I never thought they would reach out that far to scam people. But as they appear to target foreigners in Taiwan I thought to share this warning with you.

  1. Never make deals over the phone (its usually not legal anyways)
  2. If it sounds too good to be true - then it is.
  3. Only invest with legit, truely registered company’s (or just stick with the common big banks like I do).
  4. You may pay an advisor but don’t allow him to invest for you or touch anything of your own capital (unless you know him very very well)
2

I think I had the same calls a couple of weeks ago but I was on the MRT and couldn’t really hear what the woman was saying. She called back but the same thing happened. Didn’t hear anymore after that.

3

This is pretty common. I do clothing business out of China, so my contact details are on a few B2B websites

I get the same call often as described by the OP. However, I just tell them that I have seen the Boiler Room and I ain’t Harry Reynard. This is usually followed by a F your mama. :raspberry:

Once or twice “my broker” called a week after the original call. He also got the F your mama.

I actually knew a guy who made a fortune doing this based in the Philippines. He ended up snorting the majority up his nose.

As they say easy come easy go. Alternatively, there is a sucker born every minute. Depends on your POV.

4

I think they are mainly going after expats in China, people are falling over themselves to sell shitty investment products and insurance to dumb expats. I know a few people working in Shanghai who get hassled daily, it’s probably a good thing that Taiwan is off the radar.

5

Korean can’t even pronounce Shaw.

6

The website IP traces to Malaysia. so maybe the first women who called me was in Malaysia, not India.
What surprises me the most is to what extend they go to make it look legit.

7

Peter Kennedy
Ph +82-2-398-5852
Fax +82-2-398-5853
:whistle:
But it sure smells like a scam. :hand:

8

I get the same calls. I just put the receiver on the desk until they realise that nobody’s listening and hang up. They stop calling, eventually.

9

Funnily enough, after six months with no calls, one of these scumbags has called me three times today. Must be the season for it.

10

They call me too, I always tell them that I am not interested and that I want them to call at a time I am not in the office.

11

Got another one today out of China. The guy sounded drunk. Trying to flog shares in a company that makes applications for Android.