Friday, November 11, 2011

Validated Carbon Credits and Baron Traders Limited Have (Update: Briefly) Left the Building

By Richard Smith

My last post about the scam carbon credits company, Validated Carbon Credits, was carefully sown with typographical elephant traps, now tidied away again (I hope!), and a load of miscellaneous needle, which is still there. All self-indulgent stuff.

First into the elephant trap was a commenter. I was trying to lure the scammer, but he can’t spell anyway, so perhaps that was never going to work. Misfire.

Next, not unexpectedly, the professionals at FTAdviser, who want me to spell their name that way and stick to it, which I am very happy to do. There is a limit to how much tail twisting one should inflict on a hard working hack. It was a cheap hit, but illustrative of a certain mindset. As long as I am permitted to keep checking the correspondence between their perfectly spelled stories and any kind of objective reality, I am content. Perhaps FTAdviser will have something more substantive to say about carbon credit scams once their blood pressure has subsided a little.

But the miscellaneous needle did its job, eliciting an angry comment from Karen Johnson, who is a sockpuppet of James Richards, the scammer who was the main subject of the post. Bullseye.

Mind you, I can see why the gender-confused Mr Richards is irritated: at posting time, if you clicked on his sites www.validatedcarboncredits.com or www.barontrading.com (which redirects to validatedcarboncredits), you got a ‘site suspended’ message. He’s not really building the case that he has nothing to hide, by doing that. Perhaps that’ll occur to him.

In the mean time, good riddance, although I expect Richards will be back very soon, in some guise or other.

UPDATE 11/11: yup, he’s back.

Topics: Curiousities, Energy markets, Media watch, Regulations and regulators, Ridiculously obvious scams, Risk and risk management

Email This Post Email This Post Posted by Richard Smith at 8:37 am

10 Comments » Links to this post

10 Comments:

  • GTF says:
    November 11, 2011 at 11:50 am

    Money

  • Preet Bharara says:
    November 11, 2011 at 12:22 pm

    So money.

  • Good To Great says:
    November 11, 2011 at 1:14 pm

    Love it! Their site’s back up,btw.

  • Captool says:
    November 11, 2011 at 2:46 pm

    Such a tiny fraud
    http://www.lexology.com/library/detail.aspx?g=646e8acc-cc74-425a-bce7-7111324581bb

    • Yves Smith says:
      November 11, 2011 at 5:09 pm

      It’s not tiny if it’s your money. This started with a friend of Richard’s losing $100,000. And these scammers typically have lots of scams going.

      So why are you trying to denigrate this effort? Stealing isn’t worth pursuing unless the numbers rise to Madoff levels?

      • Captool says:
        November 11, 2011 at 6:02 pm

        No, its just I get offers from 5-10 of these a week, usually Fx ones. While i see no media incensed about the 3 billion dollar settlement by Glaxo, or all the other settlements by corporations out there. I recently talked a cousin out of working for a still extant boilerroom operation selling chinese stocks, they are now pushing gold stocks also, all listed here in the US. We still lack a real consumer protection agency and rely on 1200 people at SEC to monitor everything while there are many thousand at treasury. The amount of fraud I see in Healthcare every day, with no show jobs for politicians, and accounting that rates charity care at their full rate, while billing insurance companies 30 cents on the dollar for same care, infuriates me. I’m 45 and trying to figure out a viable exit strategy from the US. I have lived a moral life, never stolen, saved money, raised kids, and watched the frauds grow and grow. I don’t know where we went wrong, every single person who was held up to me as an example in my business life has proven to be a fraud or a criminal.

        • RBHoughton says:
          November 11, 2011 at 7:54 pm

          We are just getting started Captool and Yves is providing a great forum for the discussions. The way the global economy has developed is more like an extension of the dog-eat-dog world the Kings created in Europe than the sort of system that we can all happily sign-up for. Your help is needed.

  • James Richards says:
    November 14, 2011 at 6:04 am

    We are writing in response to some poisonous, but more importantly, completely incorrect diatribe you have written about our company. We do not know who you are or what your motives are but what you have published is completely without substance, has no evidence to back up your wild allegations and is ultimately libellous and defamatory. Our company is registered in Gibraltar and our Articles of Incorporation can be provided to anyone on request. We are a VeriSign trusted company and we are contactable by phone and e-mail. However, since you are clearly not capable of finding the truth you have failed to find us registered (how much do you know about Gibraltar registered companies anyway when you are located in Canada?) and you have never made any contact with us direct. Is there a reason for this? Usually when someone has a grievance with a company or individual, the first port of call is to try to address the situation direct. If you have the courage of your convictions why are you hiding behind the internet with no way of anyone communicating with you? We, therefore request that you provide this information so that our lawyers can contact you direct to address this situation you have created. We will be pursuing you aggressively through the proper legal channels and expect a full and public apology and punitive damages. We are completely above board, do not handle any client funds and work with a highly credible, long established UK company who have been active in the global carbon markets for a number of years. We introduce clients to them should they wish to invest or offset in carbon. Nothing more, nothing less. We would be most interested to know where you have evidence that we have scammed anyone. In Gibraltar we are under the watchful eye of the FSC (similar to the FSA in the UK) and so it would not be in our interest to mislead clients in any way. In fact, given the number of rogue companies selling carbon credits out there, it is most likely that we have lost sales through telling it like it is and not making it up in order to get a quick sale.

    Perhaps, given the situation you have brought about, we should also consider contacting all the entities who advertise on your site and explain that you are now at the centre of legal proceedings due to the entirely unfounded, libellous and defamatory garbage that you have published. Please note that Yves Smith, or Susan Webber, whatever she prefers to be called, as the Principal of Aurora Advisors, Inc. will also be receiving this e-mail.


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