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Let's be honest, it's easy to believe we can't be scammed.
But what if the fraudulent instrument is something as benign and unassuming as a CD?
In February 2009, the SEC raided the offices of Allen Stanford and charged him with running an $8 billion investment fraud, according to an Associated Press story written at the time by Stephen Bernard.
How'd he do it? By selling fake high-yield CDs, he promised relatively massive returns to his CD investors. A story in Fortune from February 25, 2009 under the byline of Alyssa Abkowitz put the yields at 16.5 percent in 1993 and 11.5 percent in 2005.
Currently Stanford is in jail awaiting his trial which begins in January 2011.
As this Bankrate story investigates, when CD rates seem too good to be true, investors need to stop and ask more questions.
Have you ever been conned? What happened?
If you have been a victim, this Bankrate story offers 5 ways to recover from a Ponzi scheme.
Follow Sheyna Steiner on Twitter.
I read your article, it was excellent! And very good points about how dangerous a scam with something as basic as a CD is, because no one...not enough people anyway...questioned it.
Good heads up for your readers. I wrote on this topic a few months ago - if interested the link is below.
http://money.cnn.com/2010/05/19/news/newsmakers/madoff.stanford.prison.fortune/