Forget Ponzi or Madoff, before them there was Leo Koretz

[Pekelo]

Currently I am listening to the book Dean Jobb: Empire of Deception. If you like financial crimes, you are going to love this. It is the incredible story of Chicago stock broker Leo Koretz, who was a contemporary of Ponzi, but he ran his much bigger fraud for much longer, for 18 years. From Arkansan rice farms to Panama oil fields, his schemes and non-existing companies worked much like Madoff's strategy, including secrecy, exclusivity and negative advertisement.

The local rich fell for it, including his family members. What is the promise of 50% annual returns between friends? He was entertaining and he loved to live big. If you want the short version:

http://www.annalsofcrime.com/04-02.htm

http://www.deanjobb.com/empire

Otherwise read the book.

 

[Pekelo]

Another good book, another master fraudster. The Jackal of Wall Street. I have ordered it from my library:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Graham_Rice

My Adventures with Your Money, by T.D. Thornton

"Master swindler George Graham Rice operated at the zenith of America's golden age of con artistry with plenty of illicit competition, but he stood apart from all others thanks to the sheer audacity, pure nerve and nefarious brilliance of his scams. Against the dark rise of American greed in the early 20th Century into the Roaring Twenties, the dapper but devious "GG" feasted on a nation of gullible prey with the flair of circus showman P.T. Barnum and on a financial scale comparable to modern fraudster Bernie Madoff.

Born Jacob Simon Herzig in 1870, he later changed his name - just as he would frequently change his swindles - to make himself into one of the most imaginatively successful villains in American history. With only seven dollars to his name, Rice parlayed a chance horse racing tip into millions, lost it all to pride and ego, then won it back many times over. Vilified by securities regulators as the "Jackal of Wall Street," he sparked riots in Manhattan's financial district by perfecting the art of "bucket shop"trading with the sole purpose of bilking the public blind. From the lawless frontier of the Gold Rush to his lust for dizzying riches on Wall Street, GG's supreme knowledge of "sucker psychology" empowered him to orchestrate everything from street corner rip-offs for pocket change to elaborately scripted gambling hoaxes for hundreds of thousands of dollars, all while being vilified by old-guard profiteers like J.P.Morgan and befriended by gangsters like Arnold Rothstein.

In My Adventures with Your Money, T.D. Thornton has given us an unforgettable real-life version of The Sting with one of America's most colorful con men at its center."

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In 1913 he published his biography with the same title, it is available here:

https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/44274

His life in pictures:

http://www.miningswindles.com/html/george_graham_rice.html